The Side Hustle ShowThu, 12 Sep 2019 09:00:00 +0000Fri, 13 Sep 2019 18:02:07 +0000Libsyn WebEngine 2.0https://www.sidehustlenation.com
enhttps://www.sidehustlenation.comnick@sidehustlenation.com (nick@sidehustlenation.com)
Learn how to turn your business idea into your own thriving small business. Starting your own business gives you the freedom and opportunity to quit your job. It doesn't take a high-flying start-up to make money or create an awesome lifestyle business.
Guests include Jon Acuff, Chris Ducker, Brian Clark, John Lee Dumas, Pat Flynn, and many Tim Ferriss and Gary Vaynerchuk proteges. Because your 9 to 5 may make you a living, but your 5-9 makes you alive.
Hosted by Nick Loper, Chief Side-Hustler at Side Hustle Nation (.com).]]>https://ssl-static.libsyn.com/p/assets/3/c/6/7/3c67127d3b2cdb99/Side_Hustle_Show_cover_art_2017.jpgThe Side Hustle ShowNick Loper of Side Hustle Nationbusiness,entrepreneurship,hustle,marketing,online,passiveincomenonick@sidehustlenation.com
Learn how to turn your business idea into your own thriving small business. Starting your own business gives you the freedom and opportunity to quit your job. It doesn't take a high-flying start-up to make money or create an awesome lifestyle business.
Guests include Jon Acuff, Chris Ducker, Brian Clark, John Lee Dumas, Pat Flynn, and many Tim Ferriss and Gary Vaynerchuk proteges. Because your 9 to 5 may make you a living, but your 5-9 makes you alive.
Hosted by Nick Loper, Chief Side-Hustler at Side Hustle Nation (.com).]]>episodichttp://sidehustlenation.libsyn.com/rss352: 37 Things I Have Learned in My 37 YearsThu, 12 Sep 2019 09:00:00 +0000I wish I was half as smart now as I was at 16!

But learning everything you don't know is part of the process.

One thing I love about my work is I feel like I learn new things every day. Sometimes they're small little tweaks and hacks, and other times they're broader strategies or ideas.

I originally drafted this list 7 years ago, after my 30th birthday, but decided it was due for an update.

(I updated it at 35, too, but keep learning more!)

For context, that was pre-Side Hustle Nation, pre-podcast, pre-kids, and pre-almost everything I'm working on now. I'd been a full-time entrepreneur for 4 years already at that point, but my business had seen lots of ups and downs.

Turning 30 had hit me harder than I expected it to, and I'm guessing it was because I really wasn't where I wanted to be. I'd been battling with flaky developers, fighting with the state Assembly in Sacramento over affiliate marketing tax laws, and we were in the process of short-selling our home -- which had been a major source of stress.

Seven years later, that stuff is thankfully in past, and I’m in a better place today.

That's not to say I'm completely stress-free, but I'm incredibly fortunate to have a healthy family and to get to work on stuff I love every day. Each year that goes by makes me more and more aware of that fact.

But the life I have today didn't happen overnight. It's the result of literally decades (well, at least 2) of entrepreneurial education, trial and error, hustle, and if I'm being totally honest, luck.

In any case, here are 37 life lessons I've picked up in my 37 years on this planet.

Enjoy!

]]>I wish I was half as smart now as I was at 16!

But learning everything you don't know is part of the process.

One thing I love about my work is I feel like I learn new things every day. Sometimes they're small little tweaks and hacks, and other times they're broader strategies or ideas.

I originally drafted this list 7 years ago, after my 30th birthday, but decided it was due for an update.

(I updated it at 35, too, but keep learning more!)

For context, that was pre-Side Hustle Nation, pre-podcast, pre-kids, and pre-almost everything I'm working on now. I'd been a full-time entrepreneur for 4 years already at that point, but my business had seen lots of ups and downs.

Turning 30 had hit me harder than I expected it to, and I'm guessing it was because I really wasn't where I wanted to be. I'd been battling with flaky developers, fighting with the state Assembly in Sacramento over affiliate marketing tax laws, and we were in the process of short-selling our home -- which had been a major source of stress.

Seven years later, that stuff is thankfully in past, and I’m in a better place today.

That's not to say I'm completely stress-free, but I'm incredibly fortunate to have a healthy family and to get to work on stuff I love every day. Each year that goes by makes me more and more aware of that fact.

But the life I have today didn't happen overnight. It's the result of literally decades (well, at least 2) of entrepreneurial education, trial and error, hustle, and if I'm being totally honest, luck.

In any case, here are 37 life lessons I've picked up in my 37 years on this planet.

Enjoy!

]]>34:06nofull351: Thrifting for Profit: How I Made $270k in Sales Reselling Vintage ItemsThu, 05 Sep 2019 09:00:00 +0000The fastest way to multiply money?

It might be reselling.

That is, buy low, sell high, repeat.

Keely Stawicki started reselling when she was just 12 years old, flipping a horse saddle on Craigslist and making $100 profit.

Fast forward 15 years--and more than $270,000 in sales--and reselling is now her full-time gig. Today, Keely focuses mostly on vintage goods, clothing, and furniture--all items in great demand right now.

Reselling is a business model we keep coming back to because it checks some of the boxes for an awesome side hustle:

Anybody can do it

It doesn't require a huge upfront investment

It’s quick to get started and see results

If this sounds like a side hustle you’re interested in, listen in to hear Keely’s top tips for sourcing profitable inventory, the types of products she sees doing well today, and where she lists and markets her items for maximum exposure and profitability.

]]>The fastest way to multiply money?

It might be reselling.

That is, buy low, sell high, repeat.

Keely Stawicki started reselling when she was just 12 years old, flipping a horse saddle on Craigslist and making $100 profit.

Fast forward 15 years--and more than $270,000 in sales--and reselling is now her full-time gig. Today, Keely focuses mostly on vintage goods, clothing, and furniture--all items in great demand right now.

Reselling is a business model we keep coming back to because it checks some of the boxes for an awesome side hustle:

Anybody can do it

It doesn't require a huge upfront investment

It’s quick to get started and see results

If this sounds like a side hustle you’re interested in, listen in to hear Keely’s top tips for sourcing profitable inventory, the types of products she sees doing well today, and where she lists and markets her items for maximum exposure and profitability.

On the other end of the line is Zach Evanish, a remote real estate investor and Director of Retail for Roofstock.

Roofstock is a marketplace designed to make it easy to shop for, compare, and purchase rental properties. (Zach was Roofstock employee #3 -- and has bought 11 rental properties of his own through the platform.)

]]>Buy a house.

Rent it out.

Tenants pay it off for you.

It’s possibly one of the oldest side hustles in the books, right?

Done right, owning rental properties can be an attractive long-term income and wealth-building strategy. But done wrong, it can be a recipe for headaches and a mountain of debt.

It’s a side hustle that I know a lot of the Side Hustle Nation readers and listeners are interested in (as am I).

On the other end of the line is Zach Evanish, a remote real estate investor and Director of Retail for Roofstock.

Roofstock is a marketplace designed to make it easy to shop for, compare, and purchase rental properties. (Zach was Roofstock employee #3 -- and has bought 11 rental properties of his own through the platform.)

]]>44:15nofull349: How to Start and Grow a Local Consulting Business: Effective Marketing IdeasThu, 22 Aug 2019 09:00:00 +0000She always knew she wanted to start her own business, she just didn’t know what kind of business.

Sound familiar?

So, Sylvia Inks asked friends and colleagues what they saw her as an expert in, and what they go to her for advice and help with.

Their answers?

“They said I’m great with finances, and they said I have great research skills,” Sylvia told me.

This helped Sylvia narrow down her focus to financial coaching. From there she started networking, wrote a book, and worked diligently on her presentation and speaking skills. Her business has taken off as a result.

Tune in to hear how Sylvia found her niche, found her first clients, and continues to level up her impact and income. As you listen in, you'll notice the common theme throughout the call: conversations + action.

]]>She always knew she wanted to start her own business, she just didn’t know what kind of business.

Sound familiar?

So, Sylvia Inks asked friends and colleagues what they saw her as an expert in, and what they go to her for advice and help with.

Their answers?

“They said I’m great with finances, and they said I have great research skills,” Sylvia told me.

This helped Sylvia narrow down her focus to financial coaching. From there she started networking, wrote a book, and worked diligently on her presentation and speaking skills. Her business has taken off as a result.

Tune in to hear how Sylvia found her niche, found her first clients, and continues to level up her impact and income. As you listen in, you'll notice the common theme throughout the call: conversations + action.

]]>41:27nofull348: Blog Coaching: Building Traffic and Income to a Brand New SiteThu, 15 Aug 2019 09:00:00 +000053:37nofull347: Paid to Breathe: Make Money Hosting a Unique Local ExperienceThu, 08 Aug 2019 09:00:00 +0000Michele Mattix of SedonaMeditationExperiences.com has a unique side hustle where she gets paid to breathe.

As a tagline that sounds great, but there’s a lot more to her side hustle than just breathing.

In fact, in Michele’s own words she describes her business as helping, “people experience the spiritual side of Sedona and to bring more awareness and wellness into their life through meditation, mindfulness, and a deep connection with nature.”

Michele is able to offer all of this because she is a certified meditation instructor. The interesting part is how she's managed to carve out a profitable business model in the experience economy using Airbnb’s Experiences platform.

When travelers book a stay in Arizona using Airbnb, they are also offered one of Michele’s meditation experiences -- at a cost of course.

This enables Michele to take advantage of the huge marketing machine that is Airbnb. They drive the traffic and raise awareness of her meditation experiences, and it’s paying off.

Tune in to hear how Michele found her first experience customers, what she’s done to market and grow her business, and how you may be able to apply the same strategies to an experience of your own.

As a tagline that sounds great, but there’s a lot more to her side hustle than just breathing.

In fact, in Michele’s own words she describes her business as helping, “people experience the spiritual side of Sedona and to bring more awareness and wellness into their life through meditation, mindfulness, and a deep connection with nature.”

Michele is able to offer all of this because she is a certified meditation instructor. The interesting part is how she's managed to carve out a profitable business model in the experience economy using Airbnb’s Experiences platform.

When travelers book a stay in Arizona using Airbnb, they are also offered one of Michele’s meditation experiences -- at a cost of course.

This enables Michele to take advantage of the huge marketing machine that is Airbnb. They drive the traffic and raise awareness of her meditation experiences, and it’s paying off.

Tune in to hear how Michele found her first experience customers, what she’s done to market and grow her business, and how you may be able to apply the same strategies to an experience of your own.

]]>41:04nofull346: The Con of the Side Hustle, Beanie Babies, Affiliate Marketing, and More: 20 Questions with NickThu, 01 Aug 2019 09:00:00 +0000It’s time to dive into the ol’ listener mailbag and answer a few questions in this week’s edition of The Side Hustle Show.

I’ve had quite a few interesting questions come in since the last Q&A episode, and picked 20 to talk through in today’s show.

Like this format? This is the 8th installment of “20 Questions” so feel free to go back and binge on the older ones too:

A common piece of advice you’ll hear is to take audience questions and turn them into content, so here’s a meta example of that in action.

This episode covers the dark side of side hustling, beanie babies, affiliate marketing, and much more.

]]>35:48nofull345: A Millionaire Business Coach Takes a Look Inside My Day-to-DayThu, 25 Jul 2019 09:00:00 +0000Jaime Masters has interviewed more than 500 millionaires. On top of that, she runs some premium mastermind programs and is a sought-after business coach.

I’ve been trying to figure out the best way to get on the podcast for years, and I think we came up with something unique and hopefully compelling.

Jaime agreed to actually coach me on a couple of areas of my business.

In preparation, she:

took a look at the last 12 months of my business finances

asked me to complete a time-tracking study to see what I was actually spending my time on

had both my wife and I complete a 5-year vision document

So, if you want to hear what a millionaire coach thinks of my operations and what I could or should be doing differently, or just want hear the kinds of questions that come up, tune in.

I think you’ll find the insights applicable to your own business, no matter what level you’re at.

]]>Jaime Masters has interviewed more than 500 millionaires. On top of that, she runs some premium mastermind programs and is a sought-after business coach.

I’ve been trying to figure out the best way to get on the podcast for years, and I think we came up with something unique and hopefully compelling.

Jaime agreed to actually coach me on a couple of areas of my business.

In preparation, she:

took a look at the last 12 months of my business finances

asked me to complete a time-tracking study to see what I was actually spending my time on

had both my wife and I complete a 5-year vision document

So, if you want to hear what a millionaire coach thinks of my operations and what I could or should be doing differently, or just want hear the kinds of questions that come up, tune in.

I think you’ll find the insights applicable to your own business, no matter what level you’re at.

]]>48:09nofull344: Virtual Consulting: How to set up your location-independent Consulting BusinessThu, 18 Jul 2019 09:00:00 +0000A location-independent consulting business that replaces your day job income in a matter of months?

You might recognize Paul’s name. Paul is a productivity blogger and consultant from New Zealand. He was part of a fun productivity roundtable episode we did towards the end of 2016 -- that was episode 197 if you want to go back and check it out.

What I now know, is that at that time Paul was putting the wheels in motion on his consulting business centered around specific software tools.

Which as a side hustle tactic, is fantastic. If you can hitch your cart to a rising tide of interest in a particular tool, and become the go-to expert in that space, you can do really well.

Paul was able to leave his day job within a couple of months of starting his business. He was then able to go traveling with his wife for 6-months while working 15-20 hours a week from his laptop.

After arriving back home, he started working full-time on his consulting business. “I noticed the impact of that straight away, within a couple of months I had doubled my income,” Paul told me.

It's clear Paul has figured out this business model.

This one’s packed with ideas you might be able to apply to your own areas of expertise. Maybe you’ll even uncover some areas of expertise you never really considered that special before.

Tune in to hear how Paul came across the idea of offering his first consulting services “by accident”. As well as how he’s used several different marketing channels to drive targeted traffic to his website, and how he’s been adding more products and services to his portfolio and seen his revenue increase as a result.

]]>A location-independent consulting business that replaces your day job income in a matter of months?

You might recognize Paul’s name. Paul is a productivity blogger and consultant from New Zealand. He was part of a fun productivity roundtable episode we did towards the end of 2016 -- that was episode 197 if you want to go back and check it out.

What I now know, is that at that time Paul was putting the wheels in motion on his consulting business centered around specific software tools.

Which as a side hustle tactic, is fantastic. If you can hitch your cart to a rising tide of interest in a particular tool, and become the go-to expert in that space, you can do really well.

Paul was able to leave his day job within a couple of months of starting his business. He was then able to go traveling with his wife for 6-months while working 15-20 hours a week from his laptop.

After arriving back home, he started working full-time on his consulting business. “I noticed the impact of that straight away, within a couple of months I had doubled my income,” Paul told me.

It's clear Paul has figured out this business model.

This one’s packed with ideas you might be able to apply to your own areas of expertise. Maybe you’ll even uncover some areas of expertise you never really considered that special before.

Tune in to hear how Paul came across the idea of offering his first consulting services “by accident”. As well as how he’s used several different marketing channels to drive targeted traffic to his website, and how he’s been adding more products and services to his portfolio and seen his revenue increase as a result.

]]>49:28nofull343: Hiring Your First Virtual Assistant: When, Where, and How to Do it RightThu, 11 Jul 2019 09:00:00 +0000We all have a limit to our capacity. For some entrepreneurs and small business owners, that’s a tough pill to swallow .

But when you’re up against that ceiling you have to decide between two options. You can:

Settle in.

Ask for help in breaking through.

This episode is about growing your team in such a way that you have some breathing room in your schedule and in your mental bandwidth to do the work that’s required of a business owner.

Even though I’ve been hiring virtual help in my businesses since 2005, I’ve still got a lot to learn! This is something that’s been on my mind this year as I think about where I want to my current operations to go and who can help get me there.

To help dive into this topic, I’m excited to welcome John Jonas and Nate Hirsch to the show.

Between them, they’ve got more than 60 virtual team members and have been practicing remote management for more than a decade.

They both run platforms to help you make your first virtual hire as well:

John heads up OnlineJobs.ph, the largest remote job board and resume database for workers in the Philippines.

Nate created FreeeUp.com, a curated freelance marketplace for workers all around the world.

Tune in to hear John and Nate’s take on when it’s time to hire, how to find the best talent for your budget, and some common mistakes to avoid.

]]>We all have a limit to our capacity. For some entrepreneurs and small business owners, that’s a tough pill to swallow .

But when you’re up against that ceiling you have to decide between two options. You can:

Settle in.

Ask for help in breaking through.

This episode is about growing your team in such a way that you have some breathing room in your schedule and in your mental bandwidth to do the work that’s required of a business owner.

Even though I’ve been hiring virtual help in my businesses since 2005, I’ve still got a lot to learn! This is something that’s been on my mind this year as I think about where I want to my current operations to go and who can help get me there.

To help dive into this topic, I’m excited to welcome John Jonas and Nate Hirsch to the show.

Between them, they’ve got more than 60 virtual team members and have been practicing remote management for more than a decade.

They both run platforms to help you make your first virtual hire as well:

John heads up OnlineJobs.ph, the largest remote job board and resume database for workers in the Philippines.

Nate created FreeeUp.com, a curated freelance marketplace for workers all around the world.

Tune in to hear John and Nate’s take on when it’s time to hire, how to find the best talent for your budget, and some common mistakes to avoid.

In this episode, we’re tackling trading options -- a topic that’s been frequently requested by listeners, but is somewhat foreign to me.

To help school me on this, I’m excited to welcome my friend Kirk DuPlessis to the show. Kirk runs the super popular site OptionAlpha.com, where you can get all sorts of free options trading training. He’s been at this for over 10 years and the site has over 150,000 members.

Options trading (when done right) is a high probability form of investing, but as with all investments it’s based on risk.

Kirk explained options contracts are like insurance. As a trader, you can either be a buyer of insurance or a seller of that insurance.

On the buying side, it’s a way to kind of amplify your trading power through leverage. Instead of buying 100 shares of a certain stock and hoping it goes up, for example, you could buy contracts for a fraction of the share price that give you the option to buy the stock at today’s price should it go up by a defined amount in a certain amount of time -- the contract term.

If it does, you exercise your option and make a big gain on a small initial investment. If it doesn’t, you just lose your initial option contract purchase price, kind of like your car insurance premium if you don’t get into a wreck.

On the seller side, you’re the person selling that insurance. You collect the cash upfront, and as long as the trigger event doesn’t happen, you keep it. Kirk argues that just like insurance companies are some of the most profitable in the world, option sellers are most often the winners in the options trading game.

In this post and podcast episode, Kirk explains in more detail about how this all works in practice and shares his 8 rules for success in options trading.

]]>Is options trading legit? Is it a viable side hustle?

In this episode, we’re tackling trading options -- a topic that’s been frequently requested by listeners, but is somewhat foreign to me.

To help school me on this, I’m excited to welcome my friend Kirk DuPlessis to the show. Kirk runs the super popular site OptionAlpha.com, where you can get all sorts of free options trading training. He’s been at this for over 10 years and the site has over 150,000 members.

Options trading (when done right) is a high probability form of investing, but as with all investments it’s based on risk.

Kirk explained options contracts are like insurance. As a trader, you can either be a buyer of insurance or a seller of that insurance.

On the buying side, it’s a way to kind of amplify your trading power through leverage. Instead of buying 100 shares of a certain stock and hoping it goes up, for example, you could buy contracts for a fraction of the share price that give you the option to buy the stock at today’s price should it go up by a defined amount in a certain amount of time -- the contract term.

If it does, you exercise your option and make a big gain on a small initial investment. If it doesn’t, you just lose your initial option contract purchase price, kind of like your car insurance premium if you don’t get into a wreck.

On the seller side, you’re the person selling that insurance. You collect the cash upfront, and as long as the trigger event doesn’t happen, you keep it. Kirk argues that just like insurance companies are some of the most profitable in the world, option sellers are most often the winners in the options trading game.

In this post and podcast episode, Kirk explains in more detail about how this all works in practice and shares his 8 rules for success in options trading.

]]>50:06nofull341: How to Make Money with Wholesale Bundles on Amazon FBAThu, 27 Jun 2019 09:00:00 +0000Amy Feierman and Kristin Ostrander of MommyIncome.com have generated over $2 million in sales on Amazon over the last 12 months with a unique strategy that has high margins and lower costs per sale.

What are they selling on Amazon?

Bundles -- Think shampoo and conditioner, peanut and butter, or any 2-6 products that compliment each other and provide some added value and convenience to the buyer.

Amy and Kristin have both been selling online for over 10 years, but recently they have shifted their focus onto this specific strategy of wholesale bundles – and it’s working really well for a number of reasons.

These bundles make life easier for the 1-click ordering, free Prime shipping Amazon customer, and they make life better for you as a seller because you face less competition and can earn better profit margins.

Tune in to hear how Amy and Kristin go about their product research that leaves them confident their bundles are going to sell without any paid ads, product reviews, or marketing efforts.

You'll also learn how they're sourcing their inventory, the kinds of upfront investment needed, and the price points and margins they're working with.

]]>Amy Feierman and Kristin Ostrander of MommyIncome.com have generated over $2 million in sales on Amazon over the last 12 months with a unique strategy that has high margins and lower costs per sale.

What are they selling on Amazon?

Bundles -- Think shampoo and conditioner, peanut and butter, or any 2-6 products that compliment each other and provide some added value and convenience to the buyer.

Amy and Kristin have both been selling online for over 10 years, but recently they have shifted their focus onto this specific strategy of wholesale bundles – and it’s working really well for a number of reasons.

These bundles make life easier for the 1-click ordering, free Prime shipping Amazon customer, and they make life better for you as a seller because you face less competition and can earn better profit margins.

Tune in to hear how Amy and Kristin go about their product research that leaves them confident their bundles are going to sell without any paid ads, product reviews, or marketing efforts.

You'll also learn how they're sourcing their inventory, the kinds of upfront investment needed, and the price points and margins they're working with.

]]>01:01:41nofullBonus: How to Start an Audience BusinessMon, 24 Jun 2019 09:00:00 +0000Over the last 10 years, the bulk of my energy and attention has been on building audience businesses.

These types of businesses (usually) involve creating some helpful resource, and then figuring out a way to monetize the people who come by to use it. In my case, that's primarily been through affiliate marketing and more recently, advertising on this podcast.

But you also have the flexibility to sell products and services to your audience once you have their attention.

In this episode, I'll play a section from my latest book on Building an Audience Business of your own, and share why I'm giving it away for free on Amazon.

]]>Over the last 10 years, the bulk of my energy and attention has been on building audience businesses.

These types of businesses (usually) involve creating some helpful resource, and then figuring out a way to monetize the people who come by to use it. In my case, that's primarily been through affiliate marketing and more recently, advertising on this podcast.

But you also have the flexibility to sell products and services to your audience once you have their attention.

In this episode, I'll play a section from my latest book on Building an Audience Business of your own, and share why I'm giving it away for free on Amazon.

]]>34:25nofull340: Affiliate Review Sites Done Right: How to Market and Monetize Like a ProThu, 20 Jun 2019 09:00:00 +0000Robert Brandl is a German entrepreneur now living in Spain with his wife and twin 16-month olds, but 10 years ago he was working full-time, wanting to travel, and was just trying to figure out how to get a blog online.

He did what most aspiring bloggers would do--he turned to Google for answers.

But he was disappointed with what he found. Nobody was doing a great job answering his question and comparing all the different options.

This is Robert’s flagship affiliate site that now has in-depth reviews of all the top website building software.

I invited Robert on the show because this is a really common side hustle business model: the affiliate review site.

How it often works is you write product reviews, hopefully attract some organic search traffic, and then collect your commissions when someone buys through your links.

We saw this most recently in the physical product space with Kieran MacRae in episode 313, where he was reviewing mattresses and other sleep-related products.

But like most businesses, there’s an art and a science to doing this right and building a truly helpful resource as Robert has. And, he’s applied the same model to a number of different niches too, including email service providers, live chat tools, and more. You can check out his whole portfolio at ToolTester.net.

Tune in to hear how Robert structures his review content to make it easy to consume, how he optimizes it for SEO, and how you might apply the same strategies to an affiliate review site of your own. Or even just to review content on your existing blog.

]]>Robert Brandl is a German entrepreneur now living in Spain with his wife and twin 16-month olds, but 10 years ago he was working full-time, wanting to travel, and was just trying to figure out how to get a blog online.

He did what most aspiring bloggers would do--he turned to Google for answers.

But he was disappointed with what he found. Nobody was doing a great job answering his question and comparing all the different options.

This is Robert’s flagship affiliate site that now has in-depth reviews of all the top website building software.

I invited Robert on the show because this is a really common side hustle business model: the affiliate review site.

How it often works is you write product reviews, hopefully attract some organic search traffic, and then collect your commissions when someone buys through your links.

We saw this most recently in the physical product space with Kieran MacRae in episode 313, where he was reviewing mattresses and other sleep-related products.

But like most businesses, there’s an art and a science to doing this right and building a truly helpful resource as Robert has. And, he’s applied the same model to a number of different niches too, including email service providers, live chat tools, and more. You can check out his whole portfolio at ToolTester.net.

Tune in to hear how Robert structures his review content to make it easy to consume, how he optimizes it for SEO, and how you might apply the same strategies to an affiliate review site of your own. Or even just to review content on your existing blog.

]]>48:07nofull339: Low Content Publishing: Can You Make Money Selling Blank Books on Amazon?Thu, 13 Jun 2019 09:00:00 +0000This week I’m excited to introduce one of the hottest side hustles of the moment, and that is low-content self-publishing.

Well, it’s the whole write the book part where a lot of people get stuck.

You might not know what to write about, and even if you do, it can be really time-consuming, and at the end of the day, it still might turn out to not be a huge seller on Amazon.

What low-content publishing aims to accomplish is to accelerate your product creation by focusing on a very specific sub-set of books:

journals

diaries

planners

notebooks

sketchbooks

and more

With these types of books, the value doesn’t come from your years of experience and a 35,000-word brain dump. Instead it comes from how you’ve structured the mostly-blank internal pages and prompts, and who you’re targeting as your customer.

With Amazon’s print-on-demand KDP print service, you can upload these products as digital files, hold no physical inventory, and collect passive royalties whenever they sell. But there’s an art and a science to it, and that’s why I’ve assembled a panel of experts in today’s show.

I’m joined by three experts in the low-content publishing space with more than 1,000 titles between them:

Rob Cubbon fromRobCubbon.com - Long-time listeners might remember Rob from episode 81, back in 2014. Rob’s been in the low-content game for the last year or so and in that time has published over 1,000 titles.

Rachel Harrison-Sund fromRachelHarrisonSund.com - Rachel built her low content business to 6-figures a year on a very part-time basis.

But as you’ll hear in this episode, there’s some seasonality that comes into play, there are some competitive factors that come into play, and there’s a little bit of a gold rush feel to all of this.

Tune in to hear how these low content publishers go about their product research (so they don’t waste their time), how they price and market their books to maximize sales and royalties, and how they manage such wide-ranging portfolios.

Well, it’s the whole write the book part where a lot of people get stuck.

You might not know what to write about, and even if you do, it can be really time-consuming, and at the end of the day, it still might turn out to not be a huge seller on Amazon.

What low-content publishing aims to accomplish is to accelerate your product creation by focusing on a very specific sub-set of books:

journals

diaries

planners

notebooks

sketchbooks

and more

With these types of books, the value doesn’t come from your years of experience and a 35,000-word brain dump. Instead it comes from how you’ve structured the mostly-blank internal pages and prompts, and who you’re targeting as your customer.

With Amazon’s print-on-demand KDP print service, you can upload these products as digital files, hold no physical inventory, and collect passive royalties whenever they sell. But there’s an art and a science to it, and that’s why I’ve assembled a panel of experts in today’s show.

I’m joined by three experts in the low-content publishing space with more than 1,000 titles between them:

Rob Cubbon from RobCubbon.com - Long-time listeners might remember Rob from episode 81, back in 2014. Rob’s been in the low-content game for the last year or so and in that time has published over 1,000 titles.

Rachel Harrison-Sund from RachelHarrisonSund.com - Rachel built her low content business to 6-figures a year on a very part-time basis.

But as you’ll hear in this episode, there’s some seasonality that comes into play, there are some competitive factors that come into play, and there’s a little bit of a gold rush feel to all of this.

Tune in to hear how these low content publishers go about their product research (so they don’t waste their time), how they price and market their books to maximize sales and royalties, and how they manage such wide-ranging portfolios.

]]>45:29nofull338: What I've Learned and Applied from 49 Awesome Entrepreneurs - Part 6Thu, 06 Jun 2019 09:00:00 +0000At the end of nearly every episode of The Side Hustle Show, I ask my guests for their #1 tip for Side Hustle Nation. There’s always a great variety of responses, and I wanted to take some time today to go through some of my favorites from the past 50-ish interviews.

This has become an annual tradition on the show, and we just passed 6 years and 8.5 million downloads!

If you like this short-and-sweet meta-style show, be sure to check out the others in this series:

And even though my primary motivation is to extract helpful tactics for you, the listener, I can’t help but learn from my guests as well. You never know when inspiration will strike or where you’ll hear the one insight that has a huge impact.

These episodes are a lot of fun to put together, and give me an excuse to revisit some of my favorite moments and wise words from the show.

From the last 49 guests, the 3 most common theme I heard was to "Take action. Just start!"

While it might sound overly generic, don’t be quick to dismiss it. If all these really smart and successful people keep saying these episode after episode as their “#1 tip,” I think it's worth paying attention to.

My #1 tip this time? Surround yourself with people on the same trajectory.

]]>At the end of nearly every episode of The Side Hustle Show, I ask my guests for their #1 tip for Side Hustle Nation. There’s always a great variety of responses, and I wanted to take some time today to go through some of my favorites from the past 50-ish interviews.

This has become an annual tradition on the show, and we just passed 6 years and 8.5 million downloads!

If you like this short-and-sweet meta-style show, be sure to check out the others in this series:

And even though my primary motivation is to extract helpful tactics for you, the listener, I can’t help but learn from my guests as well. You never know when inspiration will strike or where you’ll hear the one insight that has a huge impact.

These episodes are a lot of fun to put together, and give me an excuse to revisit some of my favorite moments and wise words from the show.

From the last 49 guests, the 3 most common theme I heard was to "Take action. Just start!"

While it might sound overly generic, don’t be quick to dismiss it. If all these really smart and successful people keep saying these episode after episode as their “#1 tip,” I think it's worth paying attention to.

My #1 tip this time? Surround yourself with people on the same trajectory.

]]>24:45nofull337: Multi Six-Figure Consulting on the SideThu, 30 May 2019 09:00:00 +0000Dr. Shirag Shemmassian decided to take action on a particular skill of his, and is seeing some impressive results -- all on the side from his day job as a research psychologist.

What do I mean by impressive?

How about $650k in revenue last year, which was more than double of 2017, which was more than triple of 2016.

He’s on a serious growth curve!

]]>Dr. Shirag Shemmassian decided to take action on a particular skill of his, and is seeing some impressive results -- all on the side from his day job as a research psychologist.

What do I mean by impressive?

How about $650k in revenue last year, which was more than double of 2017, which was more than triple of 2016.

He’s on a serious growth curve!

]]>49:01nofull336: Direct to Consumer Product Research - How to Find Your Next Profitable ProductThu, 23 May 2019 09:00:00 +0000“Everyone is researching a product, I’m telling you to research a problem,” Chad told me.

Chad Rubin runs ThinkCrucial.com, a profitable e-commerce business that he’s built by selling products that solve a pain point for people. Every product follows a direct-to-consumer strategy that lets him source and sell in-demand products efficiently and inexpensively.

Chad’s story began when he was laid off from his job on Wall Street. He started helping out at his parent’s vacuum shop, selling some of their inventory online.

He came to the realization that the profit margins were being eaten up by intermediaries along the supply chain, so he decided to get closer to the manufacturers to make more profit per sale, while still selling at a competitive price.

His first products, starting with what he knew, were vacuum filters. Once he had the blueprint down for selling at a higher margin than his competitors, Chad started sourcing new products to expand his product line, and he has an interesting and unusual way of finding product ideas.

Tune in to hear Chad’s unique take on product research, what he calls the “anti-Amazon opportunity,” and some sneaky ways you can connect with expert manufacturers.

]]>“Everyone is researching a product, I’m telling you to research a problem,” Chad told me.

Chad Rubin runs ThinkCrucial.com, a profitable e-commerce business that he’s built by selling products that solve a pain point for people. Every product follows a direct-to-consumer strategy that lets him source and sell in-demand products efficiently and inexpensively.

Chad’s story began when he was laid off from his job on Wall Street. He started helping out at his parent’s vacuum shop, selling some of their inventory online.

He came to the realization that the profit margins were being eaten up by intermediaries along the supply chain, so he decided to get closer to the manufacturers to make more profit per sale, while still selling at a competitive price.

His first products, starting with what he knew, were vacuum filters. Once he had the blueprint down for selling at a higher margin than his competitors, Chad started sourcing new products to expand his product line, and he has an interesting and unusual way of finding product ideas.

Tune in to hear Chad’s unique take on product research, what he calls the “anti-Amazon opportunity,” and some sneaky ways you can connect with expert manufacturers.

]]>40:56nofull335: The 6-Figure Pivot: How Shifting Your Customer Can Dramatically Shift Your ResultsThu, 16 May 2019 09:00:00 +0000He'd just gained 3000 subscribers and made $8000 in a matter of days, but Chris Ritter's first virtual summit didn't deliver the result was looking for.

Still, the summit was a serious turning point in his business--one that turned into a 6-figure side project in its first year. He started serving an entirely different set of customers, and went from working one-on-one to one-to-many.

Still, the summit was a serious turning point in his business--one that turned into a 6-figure side project in its first year. He started serving an entirely different set of customers, and went from working one-on-one to one-to-many.

Listen in because you’ll pick up some tactics and ideas you can apply to your own side hustle as this is one that’s ripe for replication across different niches.

It’s a story about leveling up your reach and impact and income, and evidence that opportunities start to appear once you’re in motion.

]]>46:16nofullBonus: Origins and Growth of The Side Hustle ShowMon, 13 May 2019 09:00:00 +000033:37nofull334: Unfair Advantages: How to Find Yours—and 10 of MineThu, 09 May 2019 09:00:00 +0000There's a topic that no one really talks about in entrepreneurship or online business, and that's the unfair advantages someone had starting out.

Behind every killer case study, every income report, every "overnight" success, there's a backstory you don't always hear.

The truth is, no one ever really starts from scratch. We bring our own history, perspectives, and baggage to the table.

We also have the advantage of learning from everyone who's gone before us. Like Newton said, we "stand on the shoulders of giants."

In this episode, I'll share some unfair advantages that undoubtedly helped me, and offer up some you probably have working in your favor as well.

]]>There's a topic that no one really talks about in entrepreneurship or online business, and that's the unfair advantages someone had starting out.

Behind every killer case study, every income report, every "overnight" success, there's a backstory you don't always hear.

The truth is, no one ever really starts from scratch. We bring our own history, perspectives, and baggage to the table.

We also have the advantage of learning from everyone who's gone before us. Like Newton said, we "stand on the shoulders of giants."

In this episode, I'll share some unfair advantages that undoubtedly helped me, and offer up some you probably have working in your favor as well.

]]>27:13nofull333: The Raw Truth About Blogging - How a "Dog Mom" Built her Online Business on the SideThu, 02 May 2019 09:00:00 +0000Kimberly Gauthier has been running KeepTheTailWagging.com since 2011, but things really started to take off when she niched down her focus to raw feeding for dogs.

Raw feeding is basically the paleo diet for dogs -- attempting to mimic their ancestral diet.

Her blog had than 2 million page views last year -- almost entirely from organic search in Google, and she’s monetized the traffic with a few different income streams.

Tune in to hear how Kimberly arrived at his niche, what drives content and marketing today, and how the business makes money -- all on the side from her day job.

]]>Kimberly Gauthier has been running KeepTheTailWagging.com since 2011, but things really started to take off when she niched down her focus to raw feeding for dogs.

Raw feeding is basically the paleo diet for dogs -- attempting to mimic their ancestral diet.

Her blog had than 2 million page views last year -- almost entirely from organic search in Google, and she’s monetized the traffic with a few different income streams.

Tune in to hear how Kimberly arrived at his niche, what drives content and marketing today, and how the business makes money -- all on the side from her day job.

What started with a $1000 investment (Brian's life's savings at the time) has turned into a home services empire that does $1 million in sales on any given day.

Brian's come a long way since that beat-up pickup truck going door-to-door that first summer.

His portfolio now includes house painting, moving services, and home detailing--all under the umbrella of Ordinary 2 Exceptional Brands. He’s formulated some unique and effective ways to build teams of passionate employees that share his goals and has leveraged the franchise model to grow his businesses and revenue from $0 to $444 million and beyond.

Tune in to hear how Brian started the junk hauling business as a soon-to-be college student, his thoughts on marketing and hiring, and how you can apply nearly 30 years of his own successes and failures to your business.

What started with a $1000 investment (Brian's life's savings at the time) has turned into a home services empire that does $1 million in sales on any given day.

Brian's come a long way since that beat-up pickup truck going door-to-door that first summer.

His portfolio now includes house painting, moving services, and home detailing--all under the umbrella of Ordinary 2 Exceptional Brands. He’s formulated some unique and effective ways to build teams of passionate employees that share his goals and has leveraged the franchise model to grow his businesses and revenue from $0 to $444 million and beyond.

Tune in to hear how Brian started the junk hauling business as a soon-to-be college student, his thoughts on marketing and hiring, and how you can apply nearly 30 years of his own successes and failures to your business.

]]>46:54nofull331: A Look Inside a 6-Figure Online Business: Traffic, Monetization, and MoreThu, 18 Apr 2019 09:00:00 +0000A few years ago, a side hustler named Brock McGoff reached out to me with a guest post pitch.

The post detailed how he was making, at that time, $4,000 a month, from his blog about men’s fashion, on the side from his day job.

Since then, Brock has turned TheModestMan.com into his full-time focus, into a 6-figure income, and into a media empire that expands well beyond the blog itself.

In this episode, Brock talks me through how he generates content ideas, how the business makes money, where he’s focusing his energy for the best results, and how he’s taken his site from a side hustle to a full-time business.

Don't have a website of your own yet? Check out my free video series on how to get up and running in no time.

]]>A few years ago, a side hustler named Brock McGoff reached out to me with a guest post pitch.

The post detailed how he was making, at that time, $4,000 a month, from his blog about men’s fashion, on the side from his day job.

Since then, Brock has turned TheModestMan.com into his full-time focus, into a 6-figure income, and into a media empire that expands well beyond the blog itself.

In this episode, Brock talks me through how he generates content ideas, how the business makes money, where he’s focusing his energy for the best results, and how he’s taken his site from a side hustle to a full-time business.

Don't have a website of your own yet? Check out my free video series on how to get up and running in no time.

]]>46:58nofull330: Land Flipping Revisited: From Zero to $10,000 a Month on the SideThu, 11 Apr 2019 09:00:00 +0000Roberto Chavez started his raw land flipping side hustle a little over a year ago, and with persistence, has already built it into 5-figure of monthly revenue.

This is a business model that was first introduced to me by Mark Podolsky, from TheLandGeek.com, in episode 108 of The Side Hustle Show.

He called it "the best passive income model" because it avoids "the 3 T’s" of traditional real estate investing: tenants, toilets, and termites.

How the model works is you:

acquire parcels of land on the cheap because the owners don’t want them anymore

re-sell them either for a quick cash flip, or more commonly, as an owner-financed sale.

This is where the passive income comes in as you collect monthly payments for a period of 3-7 years, or whatever terms you agree on.

For example, buy a $10,000 parcel upfront for $2,500, and resell it for $199 a month for 5 years. In that scenario, your total payments collected would be almost $12,000, and you'd breakeven on your initial investment after about a year.

Where the persistence comes in, is the initial seller outreach. It’s very much a numbers game, as you’ll hear Roberto explain. I think that’s what separates those who have success in it from, those who don’t.

Tune in to learn how Roberto finds parcels to buy for 25 cents on the dollar, how he figures out how much to offer, the due diligence that goes into these deals, and how he re-sells them for profit.

]]>Roberto Chavez started his raw land flipping side hustle a little over a year ago, and with persistence, has already built it into 5-figure of monthly revenue.

This is a business model that was first introduced to me by Mark Podolsky, from TheLandGeek.com, in episode 108 of The Side Hustle Show.

He called it "the best passive income model" because it avoids "the 3 T’s" of traditional real estate investing: tenants, toilets, and termites.

How the model works is you:

acquire parcels of land on the cheap because the owners don’t want them anymore

re-sell them either for a quick cash flip, or more commonly, as an owner-financed sale.

This is where the passive income comes in as you collect monthly payments for a period of 3-7 years, or whatever terms you agree on.

For example, buy a $10,000 parcel upfront for $2,500, and resell it for $199 a month for 5 years. In that scenario, your total payments collected would be almost $12,000, and you'd breakeven on your initial investment after about a year.

Where the persistence comes in, is the initial seller outreach. It’s very much a numbers game, as you’ll hear Roberto explain. I think that’s what separates those who have success in it from, those who don’t.

Tune in to learn how Roberto finds parcels to buy for 25 cents on the dollar, how he figures out how much to offer, the due diligence that goes into these deals, and how he re-sells them for profit.

]]>49:03nofull329: Get Better, Not Bigger: On Growth, Freedom, Online Marketing, and "Enough"Thu, 04 Apr 2019 09:00:00 +0000"Growth isn't the byproduct of success," Paul Jarvis told me. "Or at least it shouldn't be. The byproduct of success should be freedom."

Paul is a talented writer and designer who’s made a living--and a name for himself--by often taking the counterpoint to the conventional wisdom, especially when it comes to entrepreneurship and business growth.

His latest book, Company of One, caught my attention. It’s about why building a better business doesn’t necessarily mean building a bigger business.

In this episode Paul talks me through:

The decision-making frameworks he uses in his business and how you can apply them to yours

How he’s intentionally set up his own operation to maximize time leverage and freedom

How he’s built a list of 33k+ email subscribers over the 8 years and how this list drives his business today

]]>"Growth isn't the byproduct of success," Paul Jarvis told me. "Or at least it shouldn't be. The byproduct of success should be freedom."

Paul is a talented writer and designer who’s made a living--and a name for himself--by often taking the counterpoint to the conventional wisdom, especially when it comes to entrepreneurship and business growth.

His latest book, Company of One, caught my attention. It’s about why building a better business doesn’t necessarily mean building a bigger business.

In this episode Paul talks me through:

The decision-making frameworks he uses in his business and how you can apply them to yours

How he’s intentionally set up his own operation to maximize time leverage and freedom

How he’s built a list of 33k+ email subscribers over the 8 years and how this list drives his business today

]]>41:27nofullBonus: 7 Ways to Scale a Service BusinessMon, 01 Apr 2019 09:00:00 +0000As we’ve mentioned, “scaling” a service business can be one of the biggest challenges with this business model. In fact, it’s a sticking point that keeps a lot of people away from freelancing altogether.

But if your goal is to get big or even to just avoid trading time for money your whole life, there are lots of ways to scale a service business.

In the meantime, here are the 7 Ways to Scale a Service Business from this episode:

Raise your rates

Go From one-to-one to one-to-many

Hire subcontractors

Create productized packages

Play Matchmaker

Look for affiliate opportunities

Create a product

Enjoy!

]]>As we’ve mentioned, “scaling” a service business can be one of the biggest challenges with this business model. In fact, it’s a sticking point that keeps a lot of people away from freelancing altogether.

But if your goal is to get big or even to just avoid trading time for money your whole life, there are lots of ways to scale a service business.

In the meantime, here are the 7 Ways to Scale a Service Business from this episode:

Raise your rates

Go From one-to-one to one-to-many

Hire subcontractors

Create productized packages

Play Matchmaker

Look for affiliate opportunities

Create a product

Enjoy!

]]>17:53nofull328: How to Start a Service Business to Replace Your Income, Step-by-StepThu, 28 Mar 2019 09:00:00 +0000Starting a service business on the side is one of the fastest ways to build extra income. It's flexible, low-overhead, and you can probably start with skills you already have.

“I had a lot of drive underneath me," Abbey Ashley told me, about starting her service business back in 2013. "I was super pregnant and I hated my job so much,”

Abbey started offering her services as a virtual assistant, and connected with her first clients at local networking events in Washington, DC. My the time her maternity leave was up--just a few short months--Abbey had booked enough work to not have to go back to that job she hated.

On top of that, she only had to work 20 hours a week to do it, and could work from home.

There are almost no barriers to entry to starting a freelance service business, and the startup costs are minimal. (All Abbey did was make business cards for networking.)

In fact, it was a service business, a house painting business in my case, that was one of my first entrepreneurial adventures.

Over time, Abbey scaled her virtual assistant business from just herself at $20-30 an hour, to her own little virtual agency, to $75 an hour and up for some specialized work. Before long, the questions started coming in:

]]>Starting a service business on the side is one of the fastest ways to build extra income. It's flexible, low-overhead, and you can probably start with skills you already have.

“I had a lot of drive underneath me," Abbey Ashley told me, about starting her service business back in 2013. "I was super pregnant and I hated my job so much,”

Abbey started offering her services as a virtual assistant, and connected with her first clients at local networking events in Washington, DC. My the time her maternity leave was up--just a few short months--Abbey had booked enough work to not have to go back to that job she hated.

On top of that, she only had to work 20 hours a week to do it, and could work from home.

There are almost no barriers to entry to starting a freelance service business, and the startup costs are minimal. (All Abbey did was make business cards for networking.)

In fact, it was a service business, a house painting business in my case, that was one of my first entrepreneurial adventures.

Over time, Abbey scaled her virtual assistant business from just herself at $20-30 an hour, to her own little virtual agency, to $75 an hour and up for some specialized work. Before long, the questions started coming in:

]]>46:11nofull327: How to Get Unstuck: 6 Levers to Pull to Level Up Your BusinessThu, 21 Mar 2019 09:00:00 +0000Todd Tresidder took his own personal net worth from less than zero at 23, to self-made millionaire and retired at 35.

We met through the FinCon community several years ago and I've learned a ton from our conversations. Todd has a unique perspective on business and investing, and our conversations over the years always get me thinking a little differently. He blogs at FinancialMentor.com.

Tune in to hear Todd talk me through his 6 types of leverage and how you can apply those as needed in your business:

Financial Leverage

Time Leverage

Technology and Systems Leverage

Communications and Marketing Leverage

Network and Relationship Leverage

Knowledge and Experience Leverage

Enjoy!

]]>Todd Tresidder took his own personal net worth from less than zero at 23, to self-made millionaire and retired at 35.

We met through the FinCon community several years ago and I've learned a ton from our conversations. Todd has a unique perspective on business and investing, and our conversations over the years always get me thinking a little differently. He blogs at FinancialMentor.com.

Tune in to hear Todd talk me through his 6 types of leverage and how you can apply those as needed in your business:

Financial Leverage

Time Leverage

Technology and Systems Leverage

Communications and Marketing Leverage

Network and Relationship Leverage

Knowledge and Experience Leverage

Enjoy!

]]>39:41nofull326: Reselling on Amazon with a $1 Million Seller: Let’s Go Pick Up Profit!Thu, 14 Mar 2019 09:00:00 +0000Jessica Larrew and her husband Cliff have been reselling on Amazon for years. And though it started as a part-time side hustle, it turned into a serious business--they've sold more than $1 million worth of stuff on Amazon!

What's surprising – and I think exciting – is that they’ve done this is by finding profitable products to resell primarily in nearby retail stores.

How Reselling on Amazon Works

Jessica takes advantage of Amazon’s FBA program, or Fulfillment by Amazon. This is Amazon's way of crowdsourcing its inventory, and letting regular people like us tap into its world-class logistics network.

That means this Selling Family doesn't have to ship anything to the end customer, handle returns, or write up product descriptions.

How the business works is like any other retail business: you profit on the spread between the cost of your product and what it sells for. Now you have to account for Amazon's fees and shipping costs, but it's basically buy low, sell high.

And the best part of this side hustle is that you can get started today with whatever initial inventory investment you're comfortable with.

]]>Jessica Larrew and her husband Cliff have been reselling on Amazon for years. And though it started as a part-time side hustle, it turned into a serious business--they've sold more than $1 million worth of stuff on Amazon!

What's surprising – and I think exciting – is that they’ve done this is by finding profitable products to resell primarily in nearby retail stores.

How Reselling on Amazon Works

Jessica takes advantage of Amazon’s FBA program, or Fulfillment by Amazon. This is Amazon's way of crowdsourcing its inventory, and letting regular people like us tap into its world-class logistics network.

That means this Selling Family doesn't have to ship anything to the end customer, handle returns, or write up product descriptions.

How the business works is like any other retail business: you profit on the spread between the cost of your product and what it sells for. Now you have to account for Amazon's fees and shipping costs, but it's basically buy low, sell high.

And the best part of this side hustle is that you can get started today with whatever initial inventory investment you're comfortable with.

He built and subsequently sold 3 websites related to photography – that sold digital products to other photographers.

His journey started in 2012. Marc wanted to upgrade from a point-and-shoot camera to a nice DSLR and some lenses but couldn’t justify the $5k price tag for the equipment.

Instead of settling for something else, Marc set himself a challenge to see if he could raise the $5k starting a photography-related side hustle.

Things escalated quickly, from starting a site to creating digital products, he made that $5k in a few months.

Marc carried on scaling his business, creating more products, starting two more photography-related sites, and over the next 6 years pulled in more than a million dollars in revenue.

Tune in to hear Marc’s unique process for starting and growing sites, why he decided to create products before having an audience to sell to, how he used sites that already had traffic to drive sales, and how he scaled up his business to more than a million dollars in revenue in such a short space of time.

He built and subsequently sold 3 websites related to photography – that sold digital products to other photographers.

His journey started in 2012. Marc wanted to upgrade from a point-and-shoot camera to a nice DSLR and some lenses but couldn’t justify the $5k price tag for the equipment.

Instead of settling for something else, Marc set himself a challenge to see if he could raise the $5k starting a photography-related side hustle.

Things escalated quickly, from starting a site to creating digital products, he made that $5k in a few months.

Marc carried on scaling his business, creating more products, starting two more photography-related sites, and over the next 6 years pulled in more than a million dollars in revenue.

Tune in to hear Marc’s unique process for starting and growing sites, why he decided to create products before having an audience to sell to, how he used sites that already had traffic to drive sales, and how he scaled up his business to more than a million dollars in revenue in such a short space of time.

]]>35:26nofull324: Amazon FBA Japan: Make $3000 a Month Selling Private Label ProductsThu, 28 Feb 2019 10:00:00 +0000Mitch Davis is selling around $9,000 per month with private label products on Amazon Japan on the side from his day job.

(Of that, around $3000 is profit, which cover's his family's living expenses.)

Selling on Amazon Japan via FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon) opens up a whole new marketplace for Amazon sellers, and one that Mitch says is a lot less competitive than the US.

Tune in to hear Mitch talk me through:

his process for researching profitable products

how he deals with manufacturers and the shipping process,

some of the nuances that come with selling on a platform that’s not in your native language

Over the last 10 years, Adam has managed to help turn "useless knowledge" into a 7-figure operation.

Tune in to hear how this business works, how to pitch and price a trivia night, how to get a new venue off the ground, and most importantly, what makes for a great game.

Adam and I even fire some trivia questions at each other, so have your score sheets ready!

]]>38:48nofull320: Multiplying Money, Morning Routines, and $100k Side Hustles: 20 Questions with NickThu, 31 Jan 2019 10:00:00 +0000It’s time to dive into the ol’ listener mailbag and answer a few questions in this week’s edition of The Side Hustle Show.

I’ve had quite a few interesting questions come in since the last Q&A episode, and picked 20 to talk through in today’s show, including:

Let’s say you’ve got $100. How do you turn it into $200?

What's your #1 morning ritual?

Should I create a course around self-care? Am I even qualified to?

I haven't made a single sale (on Etsy) and am super demoralized. What can I do?

]]>35:11nofull319: Master, Multiply, and Monetize your Message: From Ranting in His Car to "Immortality"Thu, 24 Jan 2019 10:00:00 +0000“What I want is immortality," Jack told me. "But I don’t want it in my name, I want it in actions of others.”

With the size of his audience today and the number of people he’s helped along the way, there is a very real chance of this happening.

Jack Spirko of is a little bit of a legend in the podcasting space, and he’s built a really cool and unique business on the back of his show--which of course started as a side hustle.

Actually, it started with him recording the first year and a half of episodes in his car on his commute to work!

For the last 10 years and 2300+ episodes, The Survival Podcast has covered topics related to “modern survival.” That is, things like growing your own food, generating your own power, and of course starting your own business.

Tune in to hear how Jack built an incredibly loyal and active listener base, how he started leveraging his audience to help grow his podcast, how he built his no-extra-content-required membership site model that drives 90% of his revenue, and his tips for starting and growing your own podcast and audience today.

]]>“What I want is immortality," Jack told me. "But I don’t want it in my name, I want it in actions of others.”

With the size of his audience today and the number of people he’s helped along the way, there is a very real chance of this happening.

Jack Spirko of is a little bit of a legend in the podcasting space, and he’s built a really cool and unique business on the back of his show--which of course started as a side hustle.

Actually, it started with him recording the first year and a half of episodes in his car on his commute to work!

For the last 10 years and 2300+ episodes, The Survival Podcast has covered topics related to “modern survival.” That is, things like growing your own food, generating your own power, and of course starting your own business.

Tune in to hear how Jack built an incredibly loyal and active listener base, how he started leveraging his audience to help grow his podcast, how he built his no-extra-content-required membership site model that drives 90% of his revenue, and his tips for starting and growing your own podcast and audience today.

]]>48:59nofull318: Pinterest Marketing for 2019 and Beyond: How to Get More TrafficThu, 17 Jan 2019 10:00:00 +0000With 250 million active users, Pinterest is a content discovery platform nearly every blogger and business owner should be spending some time on.

The Pinterest tactics shared on this podcast in late 2015 by Rosemarie Groner were extremely effective ... for a while.

But I began to see declines in traffic, and today Pinterest brings in perhaps a quarter of the visitors it used to.

Still, I’m convinced I could be doing better on the platform to reach more people and help more people with my content.

Just like Google, a top-ranking pin can bring in consistent qualified traffic month after month after month.

But also like Google, there’s a certain science to the Pinterest algorithm.

To help me breathe new life into my account — and walk through how you can do the same even if you’ve never used Pinterest before, I invited Kate Ahl from SimplePinMedia.com to join me on the show.

She’s an expert on all things Pinterest marketing, and in this episode, she breaks down everything I’m doing wrong and what you and I should be doing instead to start reaching more people and driving more traffic.

Tune in to hear the right way to set up your profile, how to set up and optimize your pins and boards to increase your reach, and how to rank you content in Pinterest's search results to drive more traffic to your site.

]]>With 250 million active users, Pinterest is a content discovery platform nearly every blogger and business owner should be spending some time on.

The Pinterest tactics shared on this podcast in late 2015 by Rosemarie Groner were extremely effective ... for a while.

But I began to see declines in traffic, and today Pinterest brings in perhaps a quarter of the visitors it used to.

Still, I’m convinced I could be doing better on the platform to reach more people and help more people with my content.

Just like Google, a top-ranking pin can bring in consistent qualified traffic month after month after month.

But also like Google, there’s a certain science to the Pinterest algorithm.

To help me breathe new life into my account — and walk through how you can do the same even if you’ve never used Pinterest before, I invited Kate Ahl from SimplePinMedia.com to join me on the show.

She’s an expert on all things Pinterest marketing, and in this episode, she breaks down everything I’m doing wrong and what you and I should be doing instead to start reaching more people and driving more traffic.

Tune in to hear the right way to set up your profile, how to set up and optimize your pins and boards to increase your reach, and how to rank you content in Pinterest's search results to drive more traffic to your site.

]]>56:31nofull317: Licensing or Franchising a Business? How a School Nurse Started a 6-Figure Side HustleThu, 10 Jan 2019 10:00:00 +0000“It’s a business with training wheels,” Timika told me.

Timika Downes is a school nurse by day but was looking for ways to add income after hours, and ended up licensing someone else’s business idea.

Her side hustle is a lice clinic; a brick-and-mortar facility that helps parents and kids get rid of lice.

Not the most glamorous niche in the world, but Timika’s clinic did 6-figures in her first year, all on the side from her day job, and it now runs with little time investment from her.

Her story is an interesting one. It highlights the differences between licensing and franchising a business, and Timika explains how you can leverage the support of a licensing company to get a business off the ground quickly.

Tune in to hear how Timika evaluated the risks and benefits of the licensing opportunity, how she drives business, and how she’s set this up to be a hands-off 6-figure business.

]]>“It’s a business with training wheels,” Timika told me.

Timika Downes is a school nurse by day but was looking for ways to add income after hours, and ended up licensing someone else’s business idea.

Her side hustle is a lice clinic; a brick-and-mortar facility that helps parents and kids get rid of lice.

Not the most glamorous niche in the world, but Timika’s clinic did 6-figures in her first year, all on the side from her day job, and it now runs with little time investment from her.

Her story is an interesting one. It highlights the differences between licensing and franchising a business, and Timika explains how you can leverage the support of a licensing company to get a business off the ground quickly.

Tune in to hear how Timika evaluated the risks and benefits of the licensing opportunity, how she drives business, and how she’s set this up to be a hands-off 6-figure business.

]]>49:30nofull316: YouTube for Bloggers: From "Accidental" YouTube Channel to Full-Time IncomeThu, 03 Jan 2019 10:00:00 +0000Meredith Marsh is a “total introvert with over 3 million views on YouTube.”

When Meredith started VidProMom.com she didn’t set out to be a “YouTuber”. She started a blog and YouTube channel because she wanted to help families better capture those classic, picture-perfect family moments.

What she discovered was “a pretty big gap in the whole video creation side of things for people who are creating videos for fun,” Meredith said.

She started creating a video series on how to use a GoPro and some of the software - and things quickly snowballed.

Her YouTube channel was getting more subscribers than all her other social media metrics and blog visitors added together – so it was obvious that YouTube was the ideal platform for her content.

A year after starting her channel Meredith left her day job, and her blog/YouTube channel that started as a side hustle is now her full-time job.

Tune in to hear how to set up your YouTube channel for success, how to master the YouTube algorithm to reach more people, and how to make money from your new video content.

]]>Meredith Marsh is a “total introvert with over 3 million views on YouTube.”

When Meredith started VidProMom.com she didn’t set out to be a “YouTuber”. She started a blog and YouTube channel because she wanted to help families better capture those classic, picture-perfect family moments.

What she discovered was “a pretty big gap in the whole video creation side of things for people who are creating videos for fun,” Meredith said.

She started creating a video series on how to use a GoPro and some of the software - and things quickly snowballed.

Her YouTube channel was getting more subscribers than all her other social media metrics and blog visitors added together – so it was obvious that YouTube was the ideal platform for her content.

It’s a site she built to write about her new hobby in airsoft, which Kelly described as a war games sport, like the Call of Duty video games in real life.

Kelly started playing airsoft regularly in 2014. However, she was disappointed with the lack of airsoft content online for women. "Be the change you want to see in the world, right?" she told me about why she started her blog.

She started her blog along with an Instagram account, and it’s actually been her Instagram following that has become the linchpin of her business.

Her Instagram following has gone from 0-65k in less than 4 years, and it's this popularity on Instagram that has helped her land paid guest posts, social media sponsorships, grow her social media management business, and secure other business opportunities.

Tune in to hear how Kelly has grown her audience from 0 to more than 60k followers, how she first monetized her blog, and how she develops profitable relationships with other companies in the airsoft space.

It’s a site she built to write about her new hobby in airsoft, which Kelly described as a war games sport, like the Call of Duty video games in real life.

Kelly started playing airsoft regularly in 2014. However, she was disappointed with the lack of airsoft content online for women. "Be the change you want to see in the world, right?" she told me about why she started her blog.

She started her blog along with an Instagram account, and it’s actually been her Instagram following that has become the linchpin of her business.

Her Instagram following has gone from 0-65k in less than 4 years, and it's this popularity on Instagram that has helped her land paid guest posts, social media sponsorships, grow her social media management business, and secure other business opportunities.

Tune in to hear how Kelly has grown her audience from 0 to more than 60k followers, how she first monetized her blog, and how she develops profitable relationships with other companies in the airsoft space.

]]>09:16nofull314: The Simple Way to Finally Set up and Sell Your Online Course (And Scale to $40k a Month and Beyond)Thu, 20 Dec 2018 10:00:00 +0000After sitting in on a free webinar and seeing dozens of people buying a course about urban farming, Nate knew he could also create and sell his own course.

Nate Dodson of MicroGreensFarmer.com began urban farming initially to take greater control over the food he was eating and to combat Crohn’s disease.

But he soon found himself growing more than he could reasonably consume, so like any good entrepreneur, he started selling his produce – and specifically microgreens.

With a little bit of effort, he was selling $400 a week worth of microgreens to farmer’s market vendors, local restaurants, and home delivery in his town.

But Nate’s little side project has absolutely exploded in the last 2 years, and it hasn’t come from selling more produce. Instead, it’s come from teaching other people how to do what he did.

Today Nate is selling $40-50k worth of his microgreens business course a month, mostly on autopilot, and he’s followed a very straightforward path to get there that anyone can apply to their own business.

Tune in to hear how he created his product, how he drives consistent traffic, the simple sales funnel he uses to convert browsers into buyers, and the changes he’s made in his business to increase his revenue to $50k+ a month.

]]>After sitting in on a free webinar and seeing dozens of people buying a course about urban farming, Nate knew he could also create and sell his own course.

Nate Dodson of MicroGreensFarmer.com began urban farming initially to take greater control over the food he was eating and to combat Crohn’s disease.

But he soon found himself growing more than he could reasonably consume, so like any good entrepreneur, he started selling his produce – and specifically microgreens.

With a little bit of effort, he was selling $400 a week worth of microgreens to farmer’s market vendors, local restaurants, and home delivery in his town.

But Nate’s little side project has absolutely exploded in the last 2 years, and it hasn’t come from selling more produce. Instead, it’s come from teaching other people how to do what he did.

Today Nate is selling $40-50k worth of his microgreens business course a month, mostly on autopilot, and he’s followed a very straightforward path to get there that anyone can apply to their own business.

Tune in to hear how he created his product, how he drives consistent traffic, the simple sales funnel he uses to convert browsers into buyers, and the changes he’s made in his business to increase his revenue to $50k+ a month.

]]>40:45nofull313: Making Money in Your Sleep - By Blogging About SleepThu, 13 Dec 2018 10:00:00 +0000“Everyone needs it, people tend not to get enough of it – so that’s how the site came about,” said Kieran.

Kieran MacRae is talking about sleep.

The site he started is called TheDozyOwl.co.uk, a UK-based site that Kieran has taken from $0 to $2.5k a month in revenue in its first 12 months.

And for a while, Alan didn't have a great response. That is, until he learned about Kieran, who was earning a full-time income blogging about sleep and sleep-related products.

Tune in to hear how Kieran came up with the idea for his site, how he creates the content, and how the site makes money – without a server-shattering volume of traffic.

]]>36:31nofull312: 6 Rules to Scale any Side HustleThu, 06 Dec 2018 10:00:00 +0000If you're still doing all the work in your side hustle or business yourself, you're limiting your growth.

This is an episode about getting out of your own way--about the transformation from technician to business owner.

To help me work through the 6 Rules of Scale, I invited Sean Marshall from FamilyRocketship.com back to the program.

We last heard from Sean way back in episode 92 in early 2015. I think he’s someone worth paying attention to because he’s set up his business (an online marketing agency) in such a way that the day-to-day operations don’t require much of his direct involvement at all.

On the surface, his is a freelancing business, but Sean has avoided the common freelancing trap (or ceiling) of trading his own time for money.

In doing so, that affords him and his family a pretty cool lifestyle. Last time we caught up they were living in Cozumel Mexico, and today, he and his wife and 3 daughters are spending several months in Scotland.

Before we dive into the 6 Rules with Sean, he proposed two questions to ponder as pre-requisites:

Why did you start your business in the first place? What do you want out of it? How big do you want it to be?

What’s the highest and best use of your time? To achieve that ultimate why from question #1, what things do you need to do to get there, and equally important, what are the things you need to stop doing.

So those are 2 questions to keep in mind as we go through this episode.

]]>If you're still doing all the work in your side hustle or business yourself, you're limiting your growth.

This is an episode about getting out of your own way--about the transformation from technician to business owner.

To help me work through the 6 Rules of Scale, I invited Sean Marshall from FamilyRocketship.com back to the program.

We last heard from Sean way back in episode 92 in early 2015. I think he’s someone worth paying attention to because he’s set up his business (an online marketing agency) in such a way that the day-to-day operations don’t require much of his direct involvement at all.

On the surface, his is a freelancing business, but Sean has avoided the common freelancing trap (or ceiling) of trading his own time for money.

In doing so, that affords him and his family a pretty cool lifestyle. Last time we caught up they were living in Cozumel Mexico, and today, he and his wife and 3 daughters are spending several months in Scotland.

Before we dive into the 6 Rules with Sean, he proposed two questions to ponder as pre-requisites:

Why did you start your business in the first place? What do you want out of it? How big do you want it to be?

What’s the highest and best use of your time? To achieve that ultimate why from question #1, what things do you need to do to get there, and equally important, what are the things you need to stop doing.

So those are 2 questions to keep in mind as we go through this episode.

Starting a little over a year ago, she’s built a tribe of over 10,000 followers, raised $8,000 on Kickstarter for her first product, and now sells $1000 worth of that product on autopilot every month.

April built most of her tribe on Instagram, a platform that’s saturated with fitness-related content and notoriously difficult to convert followers into customers.

Tune in to hear how April found her tribe, converted them into followers and customers, and the products and services she created that ultimately funded her quitting that cubical job to do something she loves.

]]>Her escape plan was an interesting one.

April Whitney was staring at a future of pharmaceutical copywriting, and wanted out.

Starting a little over a year ago, she’s built a tribe of over 10,000 followers, raised $8,000 on Kickstarter for her first product, and now sells $1000 worth of that product on autopilot every month.

April built most of her tribe on Instagram, a platform that’s saturated with fitness-related content and notoriously difficult to convert followers into customers.

Tune in to hear how April found her tribe, converted them into followers and customers, and the products and services she created that ultimately funded her quitting that cubical job to do something she loves.

]]>36:54nofull310: 10 Creative Side Hustles that Make Real MoneyThu, 22 Nov 2018 10:00:00 +0000In this episode of the Side Hustle Show I’ve put together a round up of creative side hustle ideas that people have shared with me over the last couple of years.

It's not just about getting more stuff done; it's about getting more of the right stuff done.

So how can we be more intentional, proactive, and destination-driven with our days, instead of just reacting to everything life throws at us?

Today I want to share 5 ways -- 5 key habits -- I’ve found that will help you be more effective, excited, satisfied every day.

And because I've seen their power firsthand, these are the 5 habits I've baked into my brand new Progress Journal. (Official subtitle: A Simple Daily Planner to Make Meaningful Progress on Your Most Important Work.)

It's not just about getting more stuff done; it's about getting more of the right stuff done.

So how can we be more intentional, proactive, and destination-driven with our days, instead of just reacting to everything life throws at us?

Today I want to share 5 ways -- 5 key habits -- I’ve found that will help you be more effective, excited, satisfied every day.

And because I've seen their power firsthand, these are the 5 habits I've baked into my brand new Progress Journal. (Official subtitle: A Simple Daily Planner to Make Meaningful Progress on Your Most Important Work.)

]]>14:27nofull308: How to Start a Knife Sharpening BusinessThu, 08 Nov 2018 10:00:00 +0000Every house in the country is a potential repeat customer...

Matt Rowell set himself the goal of generating an extra $5k over 5 years to fund some passion projects, and he’s well on his way.

Matt runs AmericanEdgeSharpening.com on the side from his day job as captain of a research vessel. It’s a knife sharpening business, which was up to $250-500 a month when we spoke and is earning him $30-60 per hour.

He saw an ad while posted abroad with the Navy that gave him the idea for his business.

“If you drive down the road, every house that you pass has a bunch of knives in it,” Matt said. That means an almost limitless number of potential customers.

Tune in to hear how Matt got started with this idea while he was deployed in Djibouti, Africa, including his equipment, how he learned how to do it, and how he’s marketed and priced his service.

]]>Every house in the country is a potential repeat customer...

Matt Rowell set himself the goal of generating an extra $5k over 5 years to fund some passion projects, and he’s well on his way.

Matt runs AmericanEdgeSharpening.com on the side from his day job as captain of a research vessel. It’s a knife sharpening business, which was up to $250-500 a month when we spoke and is earning him $30-60 per hour.

He saw an ad while posted abroad with the Navy that gave him the idea for his business.

It was at a travel hacking conference where one of the speakers presented about his Amazon business, and how he was racking up tones of credit card points by buying inventory for his business that a light bulb went off for Amit.

Flipping Items for Profit on Amazon

Amit realized that if he could figure out a way to flip items on Amazon and breakeven he could step up his travel game. However, he soon found out there was real profit out there, not just from credit card cashback offers and free flights.

He shares some interesting examples of how he's stacked cashback and other discounts on the items he's flipping to effectively increase the ROI on his products while being able to sell them at a competitive price.

You'll hear where you should be spending your time if you’re starting out in the FBA space, loads of cool apps, websites, and tools that have helped automate most of his business, and the criteria he uses when sourcing goods.

Tune in to hear Amit’s favorite tools for sourcing profitable inventory, his buying criteria, and how you can stack different discounts and rewards offers to improve your margins and get a leg up on the competition.

]]>Can you find Amazon FBA profit from the comfort of your couch?

Amit Desai of CreditCard101.us has built a business doing exactly that, and now he’s on track to sell $250k worth of stuff this year – all on the side from his day job.

We’ve covered Amazon FBA and retail arbitrage before on the Side Hustle Show, but Amit has a unique angle in that he sources most of his inventory online.

It was at a travel hacking conference where one of the speakers presented about his Amazon business, and how he was racking up tones of credit card points by buying inventory for his business that a light bulb went off for Amit.

Flipping Items for Profit on Amazon

Amit realized that if he could figure out a way to flip items on Amazon and breakeven he could step up his travel game. However, he soon found out there was real profit out there, not just from credit card cashback offers and free flights.

He shares some interesting examples of how he's stacked cashback and other discounts on the items he's flipping to effectively increase the ROI on his products while being able to sell them at a competitive price.

You'll hear where you should be spending your time if you’re starting out in the FBA space, loads of cool apps, websites, and tools that have helped automate most of his business, and the criteria he uses when sourcing goods.

Tune in to hear Amit’s favorite tools for sourcing profitable inventory, his buying criteria, and how you can stack different discounts and rewards offers to improve your margins and get a leg up on the competition.

]]>47:24nofull306: How to Start a Business You Care About — With No Business Ideas and No MoneyThu, 25 Oct 2018 09:00:00 +0000From no business ideas and no money, to making your first sales in 2 weeks.

It’s not a far-fetched goal according to this week’s guest.

Alan Donegan from PopUpBusinessSchool.co.uk specializes in guiding people through this transformation, and he says that everyone has a profitable business idea in their heads – and he knows how to find it.

He does this through in-person workshops that are free to attend by forming partnerships with government bodies in cities across the UK, and he’s bringing his workshops to the US soon.

Alan is adamant about bootstrapping and not taking on a load of debt to start a business because he saw his family go through a multi-million dollar bankruptcy and doesn’t want anyone else to have to experience the same fate.

He preaches starting a business around a passion or something that excites you. Because running a business you’re passionate about sets you apart from the competition and makes the process so much easier.

He shares how he teaches his students to pre-sell and validate their ideas before putting down cash for stock that might end up collecting dust in the garage, and he outlines what makes a successful pitch.

Alan also shares how he practiced what he preaches when he sold his first PopUpBusiness workshop to a housing authority in the UK selling his highest priced package right out of the gate, and his business has been gaining momentum ever since.

Tune in to hear how Alan pulls business ideas out of people who don’t think they have any, how he has his students quickly and cheaply validate those ideas, and what makes for a successful pitch.

]]>From no business ideas and no money, to making your first sales in 2 weeks.

It’s not a far-fetched goal according to this week’s guest.

Alan Donegan from PopUpBusinessSchool.co.uk specializes in guiding people through this transformation, and he says that everyone has a profitable business idea in their heads – and he knows how to find it.

He does this through in-person workshops that are free to attend by forming partnerships with government bodies in cities across the UK, and he’s bringing his workshops to the US soon.

Alan is adamant about bootstrapping and not taking on a load of debt to start a business because he saw his family go through a multi-million dollar bankruptcy and doesn’t want anyone else to have to experience the same fate.

He preaches starting a business around a passion or something that excites you. Because running a business you’re passionate about sets you apart from the competition and makes the process so much easier.

He shares how he teaches his students to pre-sell and validate their ideas before putting down cash for stock that might end up collecting dust in the garage, and he outlines what makes a successful pitch.

Alan also shares how he practiced what he preaches when he sold his first PopUpBusiness workshop to a housing authority in the UK selling his highest priced package right out of the gate, and his business has been gaining momentum ever since.

Tune in to hear how Alan pulls business ideas out of people who don’t think they have any, how he has his students quickly and cheaply validate those ideas, and what makes for a successful pitch.

]]>37:27nofull305: Sell More by Finding the “Buy Button” in Customers’ HeadsThu, 18 Oct 2018 09:00:00 +0000Could ethically “hack” the minds of your customers and prospects to persuade them to take action?

It’s not some kind of magic or marketing trick. I’m talking about triggering a response in someone by triggering a response in their primal or reptilian brain.

Contrast – He explains why it’s important to show customers a contract between you and your competitors, and how you can do this in your industry.

Tangible – He explains why you should be using marketing information that a 4-year old would understand, and how using a story can impact our reptilian brains.

Visual – “Around 90-95% of all brain activity it about processing images,” Patrick said. He explains how you can use images to make a more powerful impact than the written or spoken word.

Beginning and End – By design, we remember more about the beginning and end of a conversation, film, book, and so on, so understanding the importance of writing a compelling hook and call-to-action can make a difference in sales conversions.

Emotional – We make decisions based on our emotions, then rationalize them later. He explains how to tap into your customer's emotional responses.

Tune in to hear Patrick explain the 6 stimuli of the reptilian brain you need to be aware of, his Pain/Claim/Gain/Brain framework for crafting effective emails, marketing materials, sales copy, etc, and how you can apply these techniques in your business to ethically make more sales.

]]>Could ethically “hack” the minds of your customers and prospects to persuade them to take action?

It’s not some kind of magic or marketing trick. I’m talking about triggering a response in someone by triggering a response in their primal or reptilian brain.

Contrast – He explains why it’s important to show customers a contract between you and your competitors, and how you can do this in your industry.

Tangible – He explains why you should be using marketing information that a 4-year old would understand, and how using a story can impact our reptilian brains.

Visual – “Around 90-95% of all brain activity it about processing images,” Patrick said. He explains how you can use images to make a more powerful impact than the written or spoken word.

Beginning and End – By design, we remember more about the beginning and end of a conversation, film, book, and so on, so understanding the importance of writing a compelling hook and call-to-action can make a difference in sales conversions.

Emotional – We make decisions based on our emotions, then rationalize them later. He explains how to tap into your customer's emotional responses.

Tune in to hear Patrick explain the 6 stimuli of the reptilian brain you need to be aware of, his Pain/Claim/Gain/Brain framework for crafting effective emails, marketing materials, sales copy, etc, and how you can apply these techniques in your business to ethically make more sales.

]]>38:01nofull304: The $5k a Month Part-Time Girl Scout BlogThu, 11 Oct 2018 09:00:00 +0000Jodi Carlson has been running her blog LeaderConnectingLeaders.com part-time since 2014 and has slowly built it up to $5-6k a month in revenue.

The earnings come from a combination of mostly digital product sales, as well as advertising, and affiliate relationships.

The surprising thing – to me at least – is that she’s done this in a niche that theoretically doesn’t have any money.

Her readers and customers are almost all volunteers and they’re donating their time to local non-profit groups – in this case, Girl Scout groups.

On the surface that makes it seem like it’s as tough a niche as any to tackle, which makes Jodi’s results even more impressive.

She brings more than two decades of experience in Girl Scouts to the table, as a scout, then as a troop leader, and even though the blog didn’t start out with dollar signs in mind she’s turned it into a substantial income stream.

“I actually started it to help myself, and to then help troop leaders in my community,” Jodi said.

Jodi started documenting the activities she was doing with her Scout Troops in her blog and making PDF books so she could refer to them again in the future, and shared her articles with a small circle of other leaders in her community.

It wasn’t long before Troop leaders further afield started asking for her activity books. This sparked the idea to start selling her books and growing her blog.

Tune in to hear how Jodi comes up with product ideas and prices those, how she made her first sales, how she’s grown her traffic to more than 100k pageviews a month, and income to $5k + a month – all while working full-time and raising a family.

The surprising thing – to me at least – is that she’s done this in a niche that theoretically doesn’t have any money.

Her readers and customers are almost all volunteers and they’re donating their time to local non-profit groups – in this case, Girl Scout groups.

On the surface that makes it seem like it’s as tough a niche as any to tackle, which makes Jodi’s results even more impressive.

She brings more than two decades of experience in Girl Scouts to the table, as a scout, then as a troop leader, and even though the blog didn’t start out with dollar signs in mind she’s turned it into a substantial income stream.

“I actually started it to help myself, and to then help troop leaders in my community,” Jodi said.

Jodi started documenting the activities she was doing with her Scout Troops in her blog and making PDF books so she could refer to them again in the future, and shared her articles with a small circle of other leaders in her community.

It wasn’t long before Troop leaders further afield started asking for her activity books. This sparked the idea to start selling her books and growing her blog.

Tune in to hear how Jodi comes up with product ideas and prices those, how she made her first sales, how she’s grown her traffic to more than 100k pageviews a month, and income to $5k + a month – all while working full-time and raising a family.

We all want our business to cover our costs of living and then some, but the "Snowball" framework (apologies to Dave Ramsey) allows you to work your way up to that ultimate goal of financial independence.

Celebrate the small wins along the way.

In this post / podcast episode, I'll break down the 15 income streams I'm working on right now. Which ones can you start or add to your existing business?

We all want our business to cover our costs of living and then some, but the "Snowball" framework (apologies to Dave Ramsey) allows you to work your way up to that ultimate goal of financial independence.

Celebrate the small wins along the way.

In this post / podcast episode, I'll break down the 15 income streams I'm working on right now. Which ones can you start or add to your existing business?

]]>31:51nofull302: Catching Up with the $30k a Month Piano Teacher — How He Grew His Business While Cutting Back His Hours 97%Thu, 27 Sep 2018 09:00:00 +0000Things were going great; he had a bunch of happy customers, he’d quit his engineering job to focus on it full-time, and he was doing what he loves.

You might remember Jacques Hopkins from episode 223, where he broke down how he turned his hobby of playing piano into a solid $20k a month online business at Pianoin21days.com.

BUT….

Between customer support, email, social media, phone sales, and all the other day-to-day tasks, it was taking a full 40 hours a week to run.

Since then, Jacques set out to automate, optimize, and outsource different elements of the business. Those initiatives cut back his time commitment to maintain the biz to just 10 minutes a day — and still grew revenue to $30k a month.

Jacques isn’t one to sit still, he’s using his newfound time freedom to work on more strategic growth projects and his other project; TheOnlineCourseGuy.com.

He’s launched a podcast interviewing other people who have successfully launched online courses, and sells his own course giving customers a behind the scenes look at how he built and sold his courses on Pianoin21days.com.

Tune in to hear how Jacques “plugged holes” in his course, outsourced time-consuming repetitive tasks to a virtual assistant, and successfully increased his revenue while reducing the time spent on his business.

]]>Things were going great; he had a bunch of happy customers, he’d quit his engineering job to focus on it full-time, and he was doing what he loves.

You might remember Jacques Hopkins from episode 223, where he broke down how he turned his hobby of playing piano into a solid $20k a month online business at Pianoin21days.com.

BUT….

Between customer support, email, social media, phone sales, and all the other day-to-day tasks, it was taking a full 40 hours a week to run.

Since then, Jacques set out to automate, optimize, and outsource different elements of the business. Those initiatives cut back his time commitment to maintain the biz to just 10 minutes a day — and still grew revenue to $30k a month.

Jacques isn’t one to sit still, he’s using his newfound time freedom to work on more strategic growth projects and his other project; TheOnlineCourseGuy.com.

He’s launched a podcast interviewing other people who have successfully launched online courses, and sells his own course giving customers a behind the scenes look at how he built and sold his courses on Pianoin21days.com.

Tune in to hear how Jacques “plugged holes” in his course, outsourced time-consuming repetitive tasks to a virtual assistant, and successfully increased his revenue while reducing the time spent on his business.

]]>43:53nofull301: Accelerate Your Business with Outsourcing: Best Practices from Hiring Over 300 FreelancersThu, 20 Sep 2018 09:00:00 +0000At a certain point, you reach the ceiling of your own capabilities, of your own capacities, and no amount of productivity hacks are going to get you to the next level.

So what do you do?

You hire some help!

That’s exactly what Bonnie Fahy started doing when she needed help with the day-to-day tasks running her real estate consulting business.

Soon after she put a virtual team in place -- headed up by a US-based project manager -- she was able to free up more of her time to focus on sales, marketing, and other areas of her business.

Those shifts ended up quadrupling her income in just a few months.

With more than 300 hires behind her, Bonnie now runs LiveMoreFormula.com where she teaches other entrepreneurs the skills of “Hybridsourcing” she’s learned over the years.

This means finding a balance between hiring domestic and international virtual assistants with the right skills to take some of your workload off your hands – at a cost-effective price.

She uses some interesting techniques too. Preferring to put candidates through “Interview dates” over traditional interviews, she explains the types of questions you should be asking potential hires, and what you should expect to pay for skilled international workers.

Tune in to hear the simple 4-step process Bonnie has refined over the years to make finding hires quick, identify top performers, and start adding virtual assistants to your team.

]]>At a certain point, you reach the ceiling of your own capabilities, of your own capacities, and no amount of productivity hacks are going to get you to the next level.

So what do you do?

You hire some help!

That’s exactly what Bonnie Fahy started doing when she needed help with the day-to-day tasks running her real estate consulting business.

Soon after she put a virtual team in place -- headed up by a US-based project manager -- she was able to free up more of her time to focus on sales, marketing, and other areas of her business.

Those shifts ended up quadrupling her income in just a few months.

With more than 300 hires behind her, Bonnie now runs LiveMoreFormula.com where she teaches other entrepreneurs the skills of “Hybridsourcing” she’s learned over the years.

This means finding a balance between hiring domestic and international virtual assistants with the right skills to take some of your workload off your hands – at a cost-effective price.

She uses some interesting techniques too. Preferring to put candidates through “Interview dates” over traditional interviews, she explains the types of questions you should be asking potential hires, and what you should expect to pay for skilled international workers.

Tune in to hear the simple 4-step process Bonnie has refined over the years to make finding hires quick, identify top performers, and start adding virtual assistants to your team.

In this special 300th edition of The Side Hustle Show, I’m excited to feature 5 listeners who took action on specific ideas they heard on the show or read on the Side Hustle Nation blog -- and turned that action into concrete results.

Those results range from their first $1000 on the side, up to a $700k e-commerce empire, but the point is they made something happen.

Tune in to hear how they got it done, and check the text summary below.

]]>300!

In this special 300th edition of The Side Hustle Show, I’m excited to feature 5 listeners who took action on specific ideas they heard on the show or read on the Side Hustle Nation blog -- and turned that action into concrete results.

Those results range from their first $1000 on the side, up to a $700k e-commerce empire, but the point is they made something happen.

Tune in to hear how they got it done, and check the text summary below.

]]>01:03:53nofull299: Trading Up: From $8.65 an Hour to Retired at 25, Plus the Next 10 YearsThu, 06 Sep 2018 09:00:00 +0000Remember the Red Paperclip Guy from a few years ago? In 2005, an out-of-work Kyle MacDonald started with a single red paperclip and traded his way up to a house in Kipling, Saskatchewan.

Remarkably, this barter adventure took only 14 trades and was completed in less than a year. Kyle started out small, each time seeking something “bigger and better” in exchange.

For example, his first trade was the red paperclip for a pen shaped like a fish. Then he traded the fish pen for a doorknob, and on and on up the ladder.

The story certainly has some feel-good elements to it, and after a while the media attention definitely helped speed the process along, but I think it’s worthwhile to revisit because we’re all trying to “trade up.”

By “trading up”, it’s important to note I’m not necessarily talking about acquiring a bigger house or a better car, but more along the lines of making bigger impacts and living better stories.

I think we all have a red paperclip story. Like Kyle, even starting with almost nothing, you can make big things happen with a little initiative and a little help from others along the way.

This episode is about connecting the events that got you to where you are today, and thinking about where you want to go tomorrow.

What’s the next trade you’d like to make?

In the spirit of the red paperclip story, I’m going to use my own entrepreneurial journey to illustrate this; and similar to Kyle, I’ll use a series of 14 key decisions or trade points. But unlike Kyle, this took me a lot longer than a year!

Remarkably, this barter adventure took only 14 trades and was completed in less than a year. Kyle started out small, each time seeking something “bigger and better” in exchange.

For example, his first trade was the red paperclip for a pen shaped like a fish. Then he traded the fish pen for a doorknob, and on and on up the ladder.

The story certainly has some feel-good elements to it, and after a while the media attention definitely helped speed the process along, but I think it’s worthwhile to revisit because we’re all trying to “trade up.”

By “trading up”, it’s important to note I’m not necessarily talking about acquiring a bigger house or a better car, but more along the lines of making bigger impacts and living better stories.

I think we all have a red paperclip story. Like Kyle, even starting with almost nothing, you can make big things happen with a little initiative and a little help from others along the way.

This episode is about connecting the events that got you to where you are today, and thinking about where you want to go tomorrow.

What’s the next trade you’d like to make?

In the spirit of the red paperclip story, I’m going to use my own entrepreneurial journey to illustrate this; and similar to Kyle, I’ll use a series of 14 key decisions or trade points. But unlike Kyle, this took me a lot longer than a year!

]]>33:57nofull298: $100k a Year Flipping Random Items: The Return of the Flea Market FlipperThu, 30 Aug 2018 09:00:00 +0000Rob is a professional "money multiplier."

The good news, he says, is it's a skill that can be learned.

You might remember Rob "The Flea Market Flipper" Stephenson from episode 147 in late 2015. At that time, he was earning $30,000-$40,000 a year flipping random products on the side from his day job.

Since then, the father of 3 has taken his buy low, sell high model and turned it into a full-time 6-figure operation.

Rob doesn’t discriminate what the products are he’s flipping, as long as he can pick it up for a great price he’ll flip it.

I can’t blame him, since some of these single deals are worth thousands of dollars in profit. In fact, Rob only buys items he estimates he can 10x when he flips them.

Since we last spoke Rob has fine-tuned his processes for finding and flipping items. He still hits the flea markets weekly, but he also uses some interesting tools and apps to find more items.

He’s also found a way to save big on shipping cost, enabling him to go after bulky items with even bigger markups.

In this “where are they now” episode, I invited Rob back to learn how he scaled up his business, what his buying criteria or flipping process looks like today, and what he’s got cooking next.

]]>Rob is a professional "money multiplier."

The good news, he says, is it's a skill that can be learned.

You might remember Rob "The Flea Market Flipper" Stephenson from episode 147 in late 2015. At that time, he was earning $30,000-$40,000 a year flipping random products on the side from his day job.

Since then, the father of 3 has taken his buy low, sell high model and turned it into a full-time 6-figure operation.

Rob doesn’t discriminate what the products are he’s flipping, as long as he can pick it up for a great price he’ll flip it.

I can’t blame him, since some of these single deals are worth thousands of dollars in profit. In fact, Rob only buys items he estimates he can 10x when he flips them.

Since we last spoke Rob has fine-tuned his processes for finding and flipping items. He still hits the flea markets weekly, but he also uses some interesting tools and apps to find more items.

He’s also found a way to save big on shipping cost, enabling him to go after bulky items with even bigger markups.

In this “where are they now” episode, I invited Rob back to learn how he scaled up his business, what his buying criteria or flipping process looks like today, and what he’s got cooking next.

]]>33:41nofull297: Event Hosting: How to Bring Your Tribe Together and Build a 6-Figure Conference on the SideThu, 23 Aug 2018 09:00:00 +0000"I'm this close to firing you right now."

That's what Hung Pham's boss told him when he reached out about ways to get his team more engaged with the company's overall mission.

Frustrated with the internal cultures at the organizations he worked in, Hung wanted to attend a culture-building conference.

The only problem? That event didn't exist.

Sensing a void in the market, Hung was inspired to create Culture Summit.

With nothing more than a website, a few contacts booked as speakers, and a whole load of enthusiasm, Hung started emailing prospective attendees and getting the word out within the right circles.

He had more than 200 attendees for that first event and was profitable from day one.

By year two, Hung’s Culture Summit, at CultureSummit.co was a 6-figure business – all on the side from his day job.

This was after Hung almost gave up and his partner left the business when they didn’t sell any tickets for the first three months.

Tune in to hear how Hung validated his idea for his conference, how he sold his first tickets, and how he’s grown this side hustle into a full-time business with attendees from 5 continents, and where he wants to go from here.

]]>"I'm this close to firing you right now."

That's what Hung Pham's boss told him when he reached out about ways to get his team more engaged with the company's overall mission.

Frustrated with the internal cultures at the organizations he worked in, Hung wanted to attend a culture-building conference.

The only problem? That event didn't exist.

Sensing a void in the market, Hung was inspired to create Culture Summit.

With nothing more than a website, a few contacts booked as speakers, and a whole load of enthusiasm, Hung started emailing prospective attendees and getting the word out within the right circles.

He had more than 200 attendees for that first event and was profitable from day one.

By year two, Hung’s Culture Summit, at CultureSummit.co was a 6-figure business – all on the side from his day job.

This was after Hung almost gave up and his partner left the business when they didn’t sell any tickets for the first three months.

Tune in to hear how Hung validated his idea for his conference, how he sold his first tickets, and how he’s grown this side hustle into a full-time business with attendees from 5 continents, and where he wants to go from here.

]]>35:53nofull296: Blogging for Multiple Income Streams – How a Part-Time Blog Became a Diverse Revenue EngineThu, 16 Aug 2018 09:00:00 +0000“I feel like this is the most important project I’ve ever worked on,” Mike said about his blog YoungArchitect.com.

Mike Riscica runs a blog, podcast, and has built a thriving community for young professionals in the architecture field.

The idea for the blog came from a pain point in Mike’s life, and for many others – passing the Architect Registration Examination (ARE).

After failing to pass the exam 4 times (before passing) and seeing his peers struggling, Mike started blogging about his challenges.

“[My story] resonated with people in a pretty serious way,” he said, and he started seeing traction within the community.

He started monetizing his blog from day one with affiliate products and continued to add more revenue streams to scale up his business with courses, speaking gigs, books, videos, and more as his traffic grew.

Today his blog in a full-time business. He's had the opportunity to travel the country with his dog doing speaking gigs, has helped hundreds of students pass their ARE, and has some interesting plans for the future.

Tune in to hear how Mike grew his blog, how it rings the cash register in at least half a dozen different ways, and the strategies you may be able to lift for your own project.

]]>“I feel like this is the most important project I’ve ever worked on,” Mike said about his blog YoungArchitect.com.

Mike Riscica runs a blog, podcast, and has built a thriving community for young professionals in the architecture field.

The idea for the blog came from a pain point in Mike’s life, and for many others – passing the Architect Registration Examination (ARE).

After failing to pass the exam 4 times (before passing) and seeing his peers struggling, Mike started blogging about his challenges.

“[My story] resonated with people in a pretty serious way,” he said, and he started seeing traction within the community.

He started monetizing his blog from day one with affiliate products and continued to add more revenue streams to scale up his business with courses, speaking gigs, books, videos, and more as his traffic grew.

Today his blog in a full-time business. He's had the opportunity to travel the country with his dog doing speaking gigs, has helped hundreds of students pass their ARE, and has some interesting plans for the future.

Tune in to hear how Mike grew his blog, how it rings the cash register in at least half a dozen different ways, and the strategies you may be able to lift for your own project.

]]>36:32nofull295: A Local Service Business that Scales - From Zero to $60k a Month in RevenueThu, 09 Aug 2018 09:00:00 +0000“I tell people I work on my cleaning business about an hour a day because 5 minutes doesn’t seem believable,” Chris Schwab said.

Chris is the founder of ThinkMaids.com, a residential house cleaning service in the Washington DC area he started on the side while still a university student.

Less than two years later, the business is doing $60k a month worth of cleaning work, all without Chris ever lifting a mop or dusting a shelf himself.

In this episode, Chris shares some of the unique tactics he used to start and grow his cleaning business, and then remove himself from the day-to-day operations.

Tune in to hear how Chris came up with the idea for his cleaning business, how he found his first customers and cleaners, and how he manages the entire business remotely.

]]>44:54nofull294: How to Start an Online Store with No Ideas and No Inventory (and still sell $300k in your first year)Thu, 02 Aug 2018 09:00:00 +0000Rene Delgado started an online drop shipping store with no ideas and no inventory and went from $0-300k in his first year in business.

It was the search for an extra stream of income that led Rene Delgado to consider e-commerce; selling physical products online.

Your role is to drive traffic to your storefront, forward the purchase order details to your supplier when a visitor makes a purchase, collecting the retail price and buying the goods at wholesale.

Rene went through a very specific product research process and ended up starting BounceHouseStore.com, where he sells bounce houses and other products related to bounce houses.

He’s already started scaling his business on the success of his bounce house store. Rene has now outsourced the day-to-day operations of this store and started a new drop shipping store that has already turned over double what his bounce house did in its first year.

There’s no luck here. “It’s hard work,” Rene said. That and some careful planning and execution.

Tune in to hear why Rene was attracted to drop shipping, the criteria he used to find the bounce house niche, and how he generated $300k of sales in his first year in business.

]]>Rene Delgado started an online drop shipping store with no ideas and no inventory and went from $0-300k in his first year in business.

It was the search for an extra stream of income that led Rene Delgado to consider e-commerce; selling physical products online.

Your role is to drive traffic to your storefront, forward the purchase order details to your supplier when a visitor makes a purchase, collecting the retail price and buying the goods at wholesale.

Rene went through a very specific product research process and ended up starting BounceHouseStore.com, where he sells bounce houses and other products related to bounce houses.

He’s already started scaling his business on the success of his bounce house store. Rene has now outsourced the day-to-day operations of this store and started a new drop shipping store that has already turned over double what his bounce house did in its first year.

There’s no luck here. “It’s hard work,” Rene said. That and some careful planning and execution.

Tune in to hear why Rene was attracted to drop shipping, the criteria he used to find the bounce house niche, and how he generated $300k of sales in his first year in business.

]]>33:40nofull293: Local Podcasts: How to Become the Voice of Your Community — and Get PaidThu, 26 Jul 2018 09:00:00 +0000Bill Nowicki has a unique side hustle. He has a podcast show called MariettaStories named after Marietta GA, a suburb of Atlanta with a population of about 60,000.

Having a podcast show isn’t unique but producing a show that’s focused on a local community is something a little different – and something you might consider doing for your local community after hearing Bill’s story.

Bill is a former Navy submariner, still a nuclear engineer by day, and had different side hustle aspirations at first – he wanted to make videos for local businesses but was finding it hard to land clients.

After meeting a charismatic 78-year-old woman at his local church he had the idea to start a podcast about people in his local community, for his local community.

He thought this would be a great way to generate videography leads. But as his show has grown and become a profit-center of its own, Bill realized that not only in his time better spent on his show but the medium of audio is more enjoyable and profitable for him than video.

Tune in to hear how Bill started his podcast show, how he marketed his show and became known in his local community, how he’s monetized the show to turn it into a revenue generating side hustle and some of the exciting things he has planned for the future.

]]>Bill Nowicki has a unique side hustle. He has a podcast show called MariettaStories named after Marietta GA, a suburb of Atlanta with a population of about 60,000.

Having a podcast show isn’t unique but producing a show that’s focused on a local community is something a little different – and something you might consider doing for your local community after hearing Bill’s story.

Bill is a former Navy submariner, still a nuclear engineer by day, and had different side hustle aspirations at first – he wanted to make videos for local businesses but was finding it hard to land clients.

After meeting a charismatic 78-year-old woman at his local church he had the idea to start a podcast about people in his local community, for his local community.

He thought this would be a great way to generate videography leads. But as his show has grown and become a profit-center of its own, Bill realized that not only in his time better spent on his show but the medium of audio is more enjoyable and profitable for him than video.

Tune in to hear how Bill started his podcast show, how he marketed his show and became known in his local community, how he’s monetized the show to turn it into a revenue generating side hustle and some of the exciting things he has planned for the future.

]]>29:27nofull292: Free Houses: How to Build a $1 Million Real Estate Portfolio on the SideThu, 19 Jul 2018 09:00:00 +0000Austin Miller built a $1.2 million real estate portfolio at 31 years old -- for free.

Buy it with the creative financing methods Austin talks about in this episode.

Either do the work yourself or hire contractors.

Put a paying tenant in the newly rehabbed home.

Refinance the home with a traditional bank loan and pay back the original funding source.

The end game is positive monthly cash flow from rental income, plus building a long-term wealth through tenants paying off the mortgage.

Austin has developed some unique and interesting ways to hard money and private money to fund his property purchases.

The best part – it’s truly a side hustle that can be done in a few hours a week the end result is passive income from rental revenue.

Tune in to hear how Austin finds killer deals, buys the houses without risking his own capital, and then rehabs them to get ready to rent.

]]>37:37nofull291: Email, Ebooks, Platforms, and Conferences: 20 Questions with NickThu, 12 Jul 2018 09:00:00 +0000It’s time to dive into the ol’ listener mailbag and answer a few questions in this week’s edition of The Side Hustle Show.

I’ve had quite a few interesting questions come in since the last Q&A episode, and picked 20 to talk through in today’s show.

Like this format? This is the 6th installment of “20 Questions” so feel free to go back and binge on the older ones too:

It’s not the only ingredient in our success recipe, but it’s a critical one -- and one I certainly struggle with at times.

Derek Doepker of ExcuseProof.com is an expert when it comes to increasing willpower and strengthening this critical success muscle we all have.

He is the author of 7 bestselling books in personal development, a speaker, consultant, trainer, and specializes in helping individuals create permanent change and achieve mind, body, and business success in as little as 5 minutes a day.

In this episode, we walk through several powerful willpower strategies you can start with today.

]]>Willpower predicts academic and professional success better than IQ, or charisma, or having rich parents.

It’s not the only ingredient in our success recipe, but it’s a critical one -- and one I certainly struggle with at times.

Derek Doepker of ExcuseProof.com is an expert when it comes to increasing willpower and strengthening this critical success muscle we all have.

He is the author of 7 bestselling books in personal development, a speaker, consultant, trainer, and specializes in helping individuals create permanent change and achieve mind, body, and business success in as little as 5 minutes a day.

In this episode, we walk through several powerful willpower strategies you can start with today.

As a long-time entrepreneur in the e-commerce space, May was used to enrolling her son in these classes to buy herself an extra hour in the afternoons.

Over the last couple years though, she wanted to diversify her income away from Amazon and wondered if she could be the one selling those classes instead.

May chose arts and crafts, a subject her son enjoyed in first grade but didn’t see available for second grade and above.

With no experience working with crafts or teaching children May jumped right in with a lunchtime demonstration and handing out flyers to the kids.

“The kids went crazy, they just loved the crafts. It was a big hit,” May said.

With her hopes set on 6 or more kids for that first class, May had 18 sign up at $120 each.

She soon expanded to larger schools, with larger groups of kids, and hired helpers. She's released a book, a training course, and hosts birthday parties and summer camps, and has hopes of franchising her model.

Tune in to hear how May has grown her after school class business and how you may be able to borrow this creative side hustle idea.

As a long-time entrepreneur in the e-commerce space, May was used to enrolling her son in these classes to buy herself an extra hour in the afternoons.

Over the last couple years though, she wanted to diversify her income away from Amazon and wondered if she could be the one selling those classes instead.

May chose arts and crafts, a subject her son enjoyed in first grade but didn’t see available for second grade and above.

With no experience working with crafts or teaching children May jumped right in with a lunchtime demonstration and handing out flyers to the kids.

“The kids went crazy, they just loved the crafts. It was a big hit,” May said.

With her hopes set on 6 or more kids for that first class, May had 18 sign up at $120 each.

She soon expanded to larger schools, with larger groups of kids, and hired helpers. She's released a book, a training course, and hosts birthday parties and summer camps, and has hopes of franchising her model.

Tune in to hear how May has grown her after school class business and how you may be able to borrow this creative side hustle idea.

]]>32:48nofull288: What I've Learned and Applied for 49 Awesome Entrepreneurs - Part 5Thu, 21 Jun 2018 09:00:00 +0000At the end of nearly every episode of The Side Hustle Show, I ask my guests for their #1 tip for Side Hustle Nation. There’s always a great variety of responses, and I wanted to take some time today to go through some of my favorites from the past 50-ish interviews.

This has become an annual tradition on the show, and we just passed 5 years and 5.5 million downloads!

If you like this short-and-sweet meta-style show, be sure to check out the others in this series:

And even though my primary motivation is to extract helpful tactics for you, the listener, I can’t help but learn from my guests as well. You never know when inspiration will strike or where you’ll hear the one insight that has a huge impact.

These episodes are a lot of fun to put together, and give me an excuse to revisit some of my favorite moments and wise words from the show.

From the last 49 guests, the 3 most common #1 tips I heard were:

Take action; learn as you go.

Be persistent. It doesn't happen overnight.

Charge more. Don't undervalue yourself.

While those might sound overly generic, don’t be quick to dismiss them. If all these really smart and successful people keep saying these episode after episode as their “#1 tip,” I think they’re worth paying attention to.

What action can you take today to apply those tips?

My #1 Tip this time? Make progress every day.

]]>At the end of nearly every episode of The Side Hustle Show, I ask my guests for their #1 tip for Side Hustle Nation. There’s always a great variety of responses, and I wanted to take some time today to go through some of my favorites from the past 50-ish interviews.

This has become an annual tradition on the show, and we just passed 5 years and 5.5 million downloads!

If you like this short-and-sweet meta-style show, be sure to check out the others in this series:

And even though my primary motivation is to extract helpful tactics for you, the listener, I can’t help but learn from my guests as well. You never know when inspiration will strike or where you’ll hear the one insight that has a huge impact.

These episodes are a lot of fun to put together, and give me an excuse to revisit some of my favorite moments and wise words from the show.

From the last 49 guests, the 3 most common #1 tips I heard were:

Take action; learn as you go.

Be persistent. It doesn't happen overnight.

Charge more. Don't undervalue yourself.

While those might sound overly generic, don’t be quick to dismiss them. If all these really smart and successful people keep saying these episode after episode as their “#1 tip,” I think they’re worth paying attention to.

At that time, the Loan Signing System course, which he teaches people how to become loan signing agents, was doing around $4k a month.

A year and half later, and they're doing around $30k a month and hosting a national conference!

But what we didn’t really cover in that episode was how to become a loan signing agent and what that business is actually like -- to the frustration of many listeners. So in response to audience feedback and several listener testimonials, I invited Mark back on the show, along with one of his successful students, to dive into the loan signing side hustle.

At that time, the Loan Signing System course, which he teaches people how to become loan signing agents, was doing around $4k a month.

A year and half later, and they're doing around $30k a month and hosting a national conference!

But what we didn’t really cover in that episode was how to become a loan signing agent and what that business is actually like -- to the frustration of many listeners. So in response to audience feedback and several listener testimonials, I invited Mark back on the show, along with one of his successful students, to dive into the loan signing side hustle.

]]>33:21nofull285: The Passive Income Service BusinessThu, 31 May 2018 09:00:00 +0000“I set up a big business just selling somebody else’s stuff,” Wes said.

Wes runs TheSalesWhisperer.com and is the host of The Sales Podcast which started around the same time as The Side Hustle Show back in 2013.

He’s an Air Force vet, a father of 7, and has built up an interesting side hustle that on the surface looks like a typical consulting business but is done in such a way that it’s set up to generate recurring passive income.

Wes has been side hustling since the 90’s and started his online business around a decade ago.

He saw an opportunity to become one of the first Infusionsoft resellers, a piece of software that not only streamlined his own business but offered attractive recurring affiliate commissions.

Wes became one of the top earners in the world and was netting $15k a month in mostly passive income, all on the side from his primary consulting, speaking, and sales training practice.

He’s adapted his strategies over the years and diversified his income streams but his business model stays similar to this day – scalable affiliate marketing with recurring passive income.

Tune in to hear how Wes started generating passive income through affiliate marketing and how you may be able to use a similar strategy in your service business.

]]>“I set up a big business just selling somebody else’s stuff,” Wes said.

Wes runs TheSalesWhisperer.com and is the host of The Sales Podcast which started around the same time as The Side Hustle Show back in 2013.

He’s an Air Force vet, a father of 7, and has built up an interesting side hustle that on the surface looks like a typical consulting business but is done in such a way that it’s set up to generate recurring passive income.

Wes has been side hustling since the 90’s and started his online business around a decade ago.

He saw an opportunity to become one of the first Infusionsoft resellers, a piece of software that not only streamlined his own business but offered attractive recurring affiliate commissions.

Wes became one of the top earners in the world and was netting $15k a month in mostly passive income, all on the side from his primary consulting, speaking, and sales training practice.

He’s adapted his strategies over the years and diversified his income streams but his business model stays similar to this day – scalable affiliate marketing with recurring passive income.

Tune in to hear how Wes started generating passive income through affiliate marketing and how you may be able to use a similar strategy in your service business.

]]>37:46nofull284: From Active to Passive Income: From $25 an Hour to 6-Figure LaunchesThu, 24 May 2018 09:00:00 +0000When Abbey made $8000 from her 1000-person email list, she knew she was on to something.

Over the last several years, Abbey Ashley has gone from earning $25 as a virtual assistant, to coordinating monster 6-figure launches of her own product.

I actually met Abbey at the bar during Traffic and Conversion Summit. Her “Virtual Assistance Is My Jam,” t-shirt caught my attention and I had to know more.

Eight months pregnant with her first daughter, she couldn't imagine putting her child in day care just to go back to work at a job she hated.

So she started devouring everything she could find online about working from home and virtual assisting. Before long, she'd landed her first clients and booked enough work not to have to go back to her old job when her leave was up.

Eventually she started subcontracting out some of the work, which was her first taste of passive income. As some of her clients were doing really well selling online courses, Abbey tried to enter that world as well.

Her first course launches were major flops.

Then she did what all good entrepreneurs do when a first attempt doesn’t go as planned. She looked at what went wrong, made the necessary changes, and tried again.

She pre-sold her next course idea to the tune of $8000 from a 1000-person list.

Her second launch generated $40k in sales, and 6 months later her next launch generated $160k in sales.

Tune in to how Abbey walked The Side Hustle Path, her actionable hacks and strategies along the way, and how she built and sold her online course even without a huge audience starting out.

]]>When Abbey made $8000 from her 1000-person email list, she knew she was on to something.

Over the last several years, Abbey Ashley has gone from earning $25 as a virtual assistant, to coordinating monster 6-figure launches of her own product.

I actually met Abbey at the bar during Traffic and Conversion Summit. Her “Virtual Assistance Is My Jam,” t-shirt caught my attention and I had to know more.

Eight months pregnant with her first daughter, she couldn't imagine putting her child in day care just to go back to work at a job she hated.

So she started devouring everything she could find online about working from home and virtual assisting. Before long, she'd landed her first clients and booked enough work not to have to go back to her old job when her leave was up.

Eventually she started subcontracting out some of the work, which was her first taste of passive income. As some of her clients were doing really well selling online courses, Abbey tried to enter that world as well.

Her first course launches were major flops.

Then she did what all good entrepreneurs do when a first attempt doesn’t go as planned. She looked at what went wrong, made the necessary changes, and tried again.

She pre-sold her next course idea to the tune of $8000 from a 1000-person list.

Her second launch generated $40k in sales, and 6 months later her next launch generated $160k in sales.

Tune in to how Abbey walked The Side Hustle Path, her actionable hacks and strategies along the way, and how she built and sold her online course even without a huge audience starting out.

]]>45:02nofull283: Your Copy Sucks! Website Reviews from a Professional CopywriterThu, 17 May 2018 09:00:00 +0000You've got less than 3 seconds to make a first impression online.

Is your website turning would-be customers away without you even knowing it?

Your site and the words you use -- your copy -- could either be making you money or costing you big time.

I invited copywriting pro Laura Belgray on the show to do some live "copy audits" of listeners' sites.

Laura is a professional copywriter with nearly 20 years of experience. During this time, she has written everything from TV promos, launch campaigns, online content, and tons more.

She is also the co-creator of The Copy Cure, an online copywriting course with Marie Forleo to help you "write like you talk and make people love and buy what you sell."

In this episode, we check out the sites from our brave volunteers and critique their language and structure. We looked at sites in e-commerce, service businesses, and blogs.

Listen in for some common mistakes that could be killing your conversion rates along with Laura's copywriting tips for compelling lead magnet offers and taglines.

I'm confident you'll get a ton of value from listening in on these website reviews and have some homework to go home and implement on your own site right away.

Tune in to hear how James landed his first clients, his strategies for growing a portfolio, and some of his favorite hacks to overcome writer's block.

]]>43:24nofull280: How to Start a Bounce House Rental Business (Investing in "Inflatable" Real Estate)Thu, 26 Apr 2018 09:00:00 +0000Corey Jeffreys turned an $800 investment into $3k in the first year and has been growing his business and adding more automated processes each year.

His entrepreneurial adventure began by exploring the world of real estate investing, when he happened upon a slightly different rental business model: inflatable bounce houses.

Corey started out renting a bounce house to his aunt as his first customer and doing all the labor himself, to where he is now with a virtual assistant from Upwork taking bookings and a delivery guy from Craigslist handling the delivery.

This is a very different side hustle from the online businesses we see more often, but Corey managed it with a small up-front investment and it set the cogs turning with possibilities of other industries this can be applied to.

Tune in to hear how Corey found his first customers, grew his business through word-of-mouth and online marketing channels, and hired help to automate his business processes and remove himself from the day-to-day operations.

]]>Corey Jeffreys turned an $800 investment into $3k in the first year and has been growing his business and adding more automated processes each year.

His entrepreneurial adventure began by exploring the world of real estate investing, when he happened upon a slightly different rental business model: inflatable bounce houses.

Corey started out renting a bounce house to his aunt as his first customer and doing all the labor himself, to where he is now with a virtual assistant from Upwork taking bookings and a delivery guy from Craigslist handling the delivery.

This is a very different side hustle from the online businesses we see more often, but Corey managed it with a small up-front investment and it set the cogs turning with possibilities of other industries this can be applied to.

Tune in to hear how Corey found his first customers, grew his business through word-of-mouth and online marketing channels, and hired help to automate his business processes and remove himself from the day-to-day operations.

Recently a friend of mine posted about how he sold his 2.5-year-old Amazon FBA business for over $400k, which I thought was incredible.

The twist was it turned out the buyer was a familiar face as well. Spencer Haws of NichePursuits.com was the seller, and Ace Chapman of AceChapman.com was the buyer.

They are both previous guests of the show. Spencer was on episodes 18 and 70 of The Side Hustle Show talking about niche sites and software, and Ace was a guest on episode 182, talking about investing in digital real estate.

“I had an idea for a product I used every day, couldn’t find exactly what I wanted on Amazon. So, I decided to find a manufacturer that can make a variation of what I like,” Spencer said.

Why was this business an attractive deal for Ace and his investors?

“The thing that I liked about the deal was the different sources of income,” Ace said.

I decided to invite them both on the Side Hustle Show to give you both sides of the deal.

You’ll hear how Spencer built up the business so quickly, why he decided to sell up, and how Ace found himself on the other end of the deal.

Tune in to hear how Spencer built an FBA business from $0-400k in less than 3 years with no prior experience in this private label space, and how Ace helps his clients raise the funds to buy online businesses.

]]>A $425k exit on a 2.5 year old business!?

Recently a friend of mine posted about how he sold his 2.5-year-old Amazon FBA business for over $400k, which I thought was incredible.

The twist was it turned out the buyer was a familiar face as well. Spencer Haws of NichePursuits.com was the seller, and Ace Chapman of AceChapman.com was the buyer.

They are both previous guests of the show. Spencer was on episodes 18 and 70 of The Side Hustle Show talking about niche sites and software, and Ace was a guest on episode 182, talking about investing in digital real estate.

“I had an idea for a product I used every day, couldn’t find exactly what I wanted on Amazon. So, I decided to find a manufacturer that can make a variation of what I like,” Spencer said.

Why was this business an attractive deal for Ace and his investors?

“The thing that I liked about the deal was the different sources of income,” Ace said.

I decided to invite them both on the Side Hustle Show to give you both sides of the deal.

You’ll hear how Spencer built up the business so quickly, why he decided to sell up, and how Ace found himself on the other end of the deal.

Tune in to hear how Spencer built an FBA business from $0-400k in less than 3 years with no prior experience in this private label space, and how Ace helps his clients raise the funds to buy online businesses.

What started as a side hustle writing about his own weight loss journey turned into a string of bestselling titles on Amazon, $3000 paid speaking gigs, 1-on-1 self-publishing coaching, and ultimately the group coaching program I invited Paul on the show to share more about.

Why go down the group coaching route?

After working with other authors on a 1-to-1 basis and seeing them achieve similar success self-publishing their books on Amazon, Paul had "an epiphany.”

By developing a group coaching program there was no limit to the number of authors he could work with.

Paul dove right in with a live webinar to test his idea for a group coaching program without a huge audience or list of his own. With 5 students signing up on the spot at $1.5k each, he started work on the content and drip-feeding modules out on a weekly basis.

Tune in to hear how Paul used the momentum from self-publishing books on Amazon to open up several other business opportunities before landing on the group coaching program.

He covers how he set the price for his program, the methods and tools he uses to automate accepting new students, delivering the weekly modules, and where he goes from here.

What started as a side hustle writing about his own weight loss journey turned into a string of bestselling titles on Amazon, $3000 paid speaking gigs, 1-on-1 self-publishing coaching, and ultimately the group coaching program I invited Paul on the show to share more about.

Why go down the group coaching route?

After working with other authors on a 1-to-1 basis and seeing them achieve similar success self-publishing their books on Amazon, Paul had "an epiphany.”

By developing a group coaching program there was no limit to the number of authors he could work with.

Paul dove right in with a live webinar to test his idea for a group coaching program without a huge audience or list of his own. With 5 students signing up on the spot at $1.5k each, he started work on the content and drip-feeding modules out on a weekly basis.

Tune in to hear how Paul used the momentum from self-publishing books on Amazon to open up several other business opportunities before landing on the group coaching program.

He covers how he set the price for his program, the methods and tools he uses to automate accepting new students, delivering the weekly modules, and where he goes from here.

]]>39:01nofull276: 27 "Weird" Productivity Hacks You Can Try TodayThu, 29 Mar 2018 09:00:00 +0000What are the quick, simple, and maybe a little "weird" productivity tricks entrepreneurs use to get more done?

Well, I'm always curious about that myself so I decided to ask 26 of my most productive and successful friends for the "hacks" and tools they use every day.

(And I added in one of my own to round out the list.)

This episode was a ton of fun to put together and I owe a huge thank you to everyone who participated! I know I learned of a few new tools to try and I'm sure you will to.

If you like this style of show, you might consider checking out last year's round-up episode as well, which asked 25 people how they made their first side hustle or business income.

You can see the participants and the approximate timestamps of their advice below. Enjoy!

]]>What are the quick, simple, and maybe a little "weird" productivity tricks entrepreneurs use to get more done?

Well, I'm always curious about that myself so I decided to ask 26 of my most productive and successful friends for the "hacks" and tools they use every day.

(And I added in one of my own to round out the list.)

This episode was a ton of fun to put together and I owe a huge thank you to everyone who participated! I know I learned of a few new tools to try and I'm sure you will to.

If you like this style of show, you might consider checking out last year's round-up episode as well, which asked 25 people how they made their first side hustle or business income.

You can see the participants and the approximate timestamps of their advice below. Enjoy!

]]>54:53nofull275: The Tactical Triangle: How to Double your Business in 30 DaysThu, 22 Mar 2018 09:00:00 +0000It's such an elegantly simple -- yet powerful -- way of looking at what really matters in your business.

Perry Marshall's "Tactical Triangle" identifies the 3 primary levers in any business as:

Traffic

Conversion

Economics

And even more powerful, there's an 80/20 Pareto Principle inside each of those. Start tweaking a few of the most important variables and you start to see some serious impact on your bottom line.

(You can get it on Amazon, but you might want to get it at PerryMarshall.com for just "a penny plus shipping" -- which will get you a front row seat to some of the best copywriting and upsell sequences in the biz.)

Over the last 15+ years, Perry has built a business as a copywriter, an author, and a sought-after trainer and consultant.

In this episode we dive into the Tactical Triangle, looking for areas to improve traffic, conversions, and economics to double your business in the next 30 days.

Tune in to hear Perry’s Star Principle, how to position your business to be #1, how to run an 80/20 survey to find out what your customers really want, and why you might consider adding a Power Guarantee to your business.

]]>It's such an elegantly simple -- yet powerful -- way of looking at what really matters in your business.

Perry Marshall's "Tactical Triangle" identifies the 3 primary levers in any business as:

Traffic

Conversion

Economics

And even more powerful, there's an 80/20 Pareto Principle inside each of those. Start tweaking a few of the most important variables and you start to see some serious impact on your bottom line.

(You can get it on Amazon, but you might want to get it at PerryMarshall.com for just "a penny plus shipping" -- which will get you a front row seat to some of the best copywriting and upsell sequences in the biz.)

Over the last 15+ years, Perry has built a business as a copywriter, an author, and a sought-after trainer and consultant.

In this episode we dive into the Tactical Triangle, looking for areas to improve traffic, conversions, and economics to double your business in the next 30 days.

Tune in to hear Perry’s Star Principle, how to position your business to be #1, how to run an 80/20 survey to find out what your customers really want, and why you might consider adding a Power Guarantee to your business.

]]>40:44nofull274: The Middleman Method: A Real-Life Example of Turning Trash into TreasureThu, 15 Mar 2018 09:00:00 +0000John made $1614 before 11am the day we recorded this episode.

His business model? Buying industrial byproducts, the kind of stuff that’s used for shipping like pallets, cardboard boxes, crates, and so on, and selling them on for a profit.

John Wilker started out buying or being given pallets free by businesses that had no need for them and selling them to pallet yards.

Realizing the pallet yards were selling them on for a profit to businesses that did have a need for them, John saw an opportunity.

John hit the pavement and started knocking on the doors of industrial businesses, large warehouses, distributors, and scrap yards.

He asked if they had pallets and other shipping byproducts they didn’t need, what they were currently doing with these items, if they needed any items, and explained how he could help.

Wanting to operate without storage space and employees John has found the perfect balance between supply and demand. He spends his mornings picking up items from one business and selling them on to another just a few miles away.

“It’s quite simple…but has to be set up in the correct manner for it to work,” John said.

It’s certainly one of the more interesting side hustles, and it sets the cogs turning to think of other niches that can fit this model.

Tune in to hear how John found his first suppliers and buyers, how he sets his prices, and how he transports this stuff without having to store it.

]]>John made $1614 before 11am the day we recorded this episode.

His business model? Buying industrial byproducts, the kind of stuff that’s used for shipping like pallets, cardboard boxes, crates, and so on, and selling them on for a profit.

John Wilker started out buying or being given pallets free by businesses that had no need for them and selling them to pallet yards.

Realizing the pallet yards were selling them on for a profit to businesses that did have a need for them, John saw an opportunity.

John hit the pavement and started knocking on the doors of industrial businesses, large warehouses, distributors, and scrap yards.

He asked if they had pallets and other shipping byproducts they didn’t need, what they were currently doing with these items, if they needed any items, and explained how he could help.

Wanting to operate without storage space and employees John has found the perfect balance between supply and demand. He spends his mornings picking up items from one business and selling them on to another just a few miles away.

“It’s quite simple…but has to be set up in the correct manner for it to work,” John said.

It’s certainly one of the more interesting side hustles, and it sets the cogs turning to think of other niches that can fit this model.

Tune in to hear how John found his first suppliers and buyers, how he sets his prices, and how he transports this stuff without having to store it.

“I purposely set out to build a brand that is outside of just me,” John said. “I’m really trying to make this a high-touch service to really help businesses connect with the right agencies for their needs.”

Tune in to hear how John earned his first finder's fee, how he's built up both sides of the Credo marketplace, and how he's priced his service in this high-touch affiliate marketing model.

]]>Getting paid to turn away work?

Being in the position to turn away work as a freelancer or consultant is an envious place to be in, but being in the position to turn away that work AND get paid for it?

Even better!

John Doherty had spent years working in the digital marketing space, both as an employee and a freelancer.

As his SEO consulting business crew, he reached the capacity of how much he wanted to work, and started essentially selling leads to friends and colleagues he trusted.

That little side side hustle is now John's full-time focus, and today GetCredo.com is generating $500-600k worth of deals for its partner digital marketing agencies.

As the connector and facilitator of those deals, John takes a commission. It's affiliate marketing, just with a bit of a twist from the kind we've covered before.

“I purposely set out to build a brand that is outside of just me,” John said. “I’m really trying to make this a high-touch service to really help businesses connect with the right agencies for their needs.”

Tune in to hear how John earned his first finder's fee, how he's built up both sides of the Credo marketplace, and how he's priced his service in this high-touch affiliate marketing model.

]]>38:48nofull272: How the New Tax Law Impacts Entrepreneurs and Side HustlersThu, 01 Mar 2018 10:00:00 +0000How much will you save from the new tax law?

It turns out that while there are some great "gives" from Uncle Sam for entrepreneurs, there are several potentially costly "takes" as well.

Death and taxes, right?

To help talk through how some of the most important tax law changes will impact your bottom line, I invited Josh Bauerle from CPAonFire.com back on the show.

Tune in to hear Josh talk through the most important tax changes and how they affect you as a small business owner or side hustle entrepreneur.

]]>34:55nofull271: Brilliant Blogging, Ruthless Productivity, and Guaranteed Success: 20 Questions with NickThu, 22 Feb 2018 10:00:00 +0000It’s time to dive into the ol' listener mailbag and answer a few questions in this week’s edition of The Side Hustle Show.

I’ve had quite a few interesting questions come in since the last Q&A episode, and picked 20 to talk through in today’s show.

Like this format? This is the 5th installment of "20 Questions" so feel free to go back and binge on the older ones too:

A common piece of advice you’ll hear is to take audience questions and turn them into content, so here’s a meta example of that in action.

This episode covers questions on blogging, affiliate marketing, productivity, my new email system, making time for your side hustle, the idea of guaranteed success, and more.

Tune in to hear my responses to those questions and a dozen more below.

]]>39:29nofull270: How to Systemize Your Business with Marketing AutomationThu, 15 Feb 2018 10:00:00 +0000How would you like to add thousands of dollars a month to your bottom line, on autopilot?

Sounds pretty good, right?

Greg Hickman of System.ly has achieved this for his own 6-figure a month business and does the same for his clients using marketing automation and effective sales funnels.

If you're wondering what marketing automation is, in Greg’s own words it's, “How to use technology to enable your sales and marketing and fulfillment strategy.”

Greg is a master in the art of offering compelling lead magnets to attract potential customers, setting up onboarding sequences and follow-up emails to keep them interested, and converting them into paying customers.

The best part is that it doesn’t need to be complicated as his own simple 4-step formula from Facebook ad to paying customer proves. Plus, when your marketing automation sequence is set up it runs itself bringing in new clients all year round.

Tune in to hear the types of lead magnets and sales strategies Greg sees working today, the questions you have to ask yourself before writing any email sequence, and how he communicates with prospects on an ongoing basis.

]]>How would you like to add thousands of dollars a month to your bottom line, on autopilot?

Sounds pretty good, right?

Greg Hickman of System.ly has achieved this for his own 6-figure a month business and does the same for his clients using marketing automation and effective sales funnels.

If you're wondering what marketing automation is, in Greg’s own words it's, “How to use technology to enable your sales and marketing and fulfillment strategy.”

Greg is a master in the art of offering compelling lead magnets to attract potential customers, setting up onboarding sequences and follow-up emails to keep them interested, and converting them into paying customers.

The best part is that it doesn’t need to be complicated as his own simple 4-step formula from Facebook ad to paying customer proves. Plus, when your marketing automation sequence is set up it runs itself bringing in new clients all year round.

Tune in to hear the types of lead magnets and sales strategies Greg sees working today, the questions you have to ask yourself before writing any email sequence, and how he communicates with prospects on an ongoing basis.

]]>48:35nofull269: How to Set Up and Sell a Paid Mastermind GroupThu, 08 Feb 2018 10:00:00 +0000Women pay up to $2000 a month to hang out with Natalie Eckdahl for a few hours.

The mother of 3 has turned her BizChix podcast (which started as a side hustle) into a thriving business based largely on paid mastermind groups. She curates groups of high-performing female entrepreneurs – and gets paid handsomely to do it.

If you’re in a consulting, freelancing, or coaching role and trying to figure out what the next step is to scale up your business, a group mastermind program could be the answer.

In fact, a paid mastermind was the first thing I sold on Side Hustle Nation, but I put the program on hold after our son was born. All of a sudden that extra hour or two in the evening became a lot harder to part with!

I wanted to pick her brain on how she set everything up and sold it to her audience.

“What I’m trying to create is an amazing brainstorming opportunity for the women that join the group,” Natalie said.

Today she’s running five separate premium-priced masterminds for 5- and 6-figure entrepreneurs, with prices ranging from $600 to $2000 a month.

But it almost didn’t happen. She was a few weeks away from putting BizChix on pause, when a fateful few customers sparked a major turning point.

Tune in to hear how Natalie sets up her groups for success, structures the meetings, and 20x’d her rates in 3 years.

]]>Women pay up to $2000 a month to hang out with Natalie Eckdahl for a few hours.

The mother of 3 has turned her BizChix podcast (which started as a side hustle) into a thriving business based largely on paid mastermind groups. She curates groups of high-performing female entrepreneurs – and gets paid handsomely to do it.

If you’re in a consulting, freelancing, or coaching role and trying to figure out what the next step is to scale up your business, a group mastermind program could be the answer.

In fact, a paid mastermind was the first thing I sold on Side Hustle Nation, but I put the program on hold after our son was born. All of a sudden that extra hour or two in the evening became a lot harder to part with!

I wanted to pick her brain on how she set everything up and sold it to her audience.

“What I’m trying to create is an amazing brainstorming opportunity for the women that join the group,” Natalie said.

Today she’s running five separate premium-priced masterminds for 5- and 6-figure entrepreneurs, with prices ranging from $600 to $2000 a month.

But it almost didn’t happen. She was a few weeks away from putting BizChix on pause, when a fateful few customers sparked a major turning point.

Tune in to hear how Natalie sets up her groups for success, structures the meetings, and 20x’d her rates in 3 years.

]]>40:57nofull268: Blogging ROI: From $18 to $100k a Month in 2.5 YearsThu, 01 Feb 2018 10:00:00 +0000Could a part-time blog really bring in that kind of cash? Rosemarie swears she only works 20 hours a week!

Yes, The Busy Budgeter is back for her 3rd round on The Side Hustle Show, and it's a good one.

If you missed the first two:

In episode 142, Rosemarie Groner's blog was about a year old and earning $5k a month. She shared a step-by-step system for generating massive traffic from Pinterest, which I immediately implemented myself.

A year later, in episode 199, she was earning $20-25k a month, and shared her "date your list" and "core affiliate strategy."

A few months after that recording, she started posting consistent $100k months from her blog, so of course I had to invite her back to hear what changed.

Tune in to hear how Rosemarie started selling her own products, the sales funnels tactics and tools she uses to turn subscribers into customers, and her tips to keep improving your ROI so you spend less time working while increasing your revenue.

]]>Could a part-time blog really bring in that kind of cash? Rosemarie swears she only works 20 hours a week!

Yes, The Busy Budgeter is back for her 3rd round on The Side Hustle Show, and it's a good one.

If you missed the first two:

In episode 142, Rosemarie Groner's blog was about a year old and earning $5k a month. She shared a step-by-step system for generating massive traffic from Pinterest, which I immediately implemented myself.

A year later, in episode 199, she was earning $20-25k a month, and shared her "date your list" and "core affiliate strategy."

A few months after that recording, she started posting consistent $100k months from her blog, so of course I had to invite her back to hear what changed.

Tune in to hear how Rosemarie started selling her own products, the sales funnels tactics and tools she uses to turn subscribers into customers, and her tips to keep improving your ROI so you spend less time working while increasing your revenue.

]]>52:43nofull267: The Hustler’s Mindset: The 10 Traits of Successful Side Hustle EntrepreneursThu, 25 Jan 2018 10:00:00 +0000This should probably be episode 1, not 267, but if I'm being totally honest, I probably wasn't in a place personally or professionally to record it as episode 1.

I’ve avoided doing a “mindset” episode for almost 5 because I didn’t think it was necessary. I thought if people are seeking out business information, entrepreneurship information, they’ve already got the right mindset.

They know what’s up.

They get it.

But older and (hopefully) wiser, I’ve come to see the mindset conversation as an important one, and one I’ve been overlooking for a long time.

This is foundational stuff, and before you dismiss this as way to fluffy for a Side Hustle Show episode, let me give you a couple points to consider on the mindset front.

The first comes from one of my favorite podcasts, Tropical MBA. Their theory is for entrepreneurs making:

$0-100k - the barrier is mindset

$100k - $1M - the barrier is marketing

$1M + - the barrier is your team

I’m sure there are counterpoints but I think there’s a lot of truth in that breakdown.

The second point to consider comes from Dane Maxwell, who was a special guest on episode 119 of The Side Hustle Show, during my public coaching experiment. Dane created several software businesses before founding The Foundation to teach others what he’d learned.

He said the easiest way to test if your mindset is in the right place is to ask if you have or are you getting the results you want?

If not, something must be missing, right?

There’s some brutal honesty in that question, and it took me a minute to wrap my head around it, but the gist of it is this: if you’re not where you want to be, there’s room for some mindset growth or changes.

In this episode I’ll share 10 traits of the hustler’s mindset and do my best to illustrate those with examples from either my own businesses or those of my guests.

]]>This should probably be episode 1, not 267, but if I'm being totally honest, I probably wasn't in a place personally or professionally to record it as episode 1.

I’ve avoided doing a “mindset” episode for almost 5 because I didn’t think it was necessary. I thought if people are seeking out business information, entrepreneurship information, they’ve already got the right mindset.

They know what’s up.

They get it.

But older and (hopefully) wiser, I’ve come to see the mindset conversation as an important one, and one I’ve been overlooking for a long time.

This is foundational stuff, and before you dismiss this as way to fluffy for a Side Hustle Show episode, let me give you a couple points to consider on the mindset front.

The first comes from one of my favorite podcasts, Tropical MBA. Their theory is for entrepreneurs making:

$0-100k - the barrier is mindset

$100k - $1M - the barrier is marketing

$1M + - the barrier is your team

I’m sure there are counterpoints but I think there’s a lot of truth in that breakdown.

The second point to consider comes from Dane Maxwell, who was a special guest on episode 119 of The Side Hustle Show, during my public coaching experiment. Dane created several software businesses before founding The Foundation to teach others what he’d learned.

He said the easiest way to test if your mindset is in the right place is to ask if you have or are you getting the results you want?

If not, something must be missing, right?

There’s some brutal honesty in that question, and it took me a minute to wrap my head around it, but the gist of it is this: if you’re not where you want to be, there’s room for some mindset growth or changes.

In this episode I’ll share 10 traits of the hustler’s mindset and do my best to illustrate those with examples from either my own businesses or those of my guests.

What started as a side hustle way back in 1981 has now grown into a $650k a year operation.

So what does Brian do?

His company picks up litter from parking lots. Sadly, it's still an essential service (boo litterbugs!), but has very low startup costs and Brian says you can earn $30-$50 an hour doing this on the side.

What prompted Brian to pick up the phone and ask property management companies if he could handle their litter picking contracts?

“I decided I liked my job but I couldn’t see myself doing this for the rest of my life and I wanted more,” Brian said. In just a few months he was earning more part-time in this side hustle than he was at his full-time job.

It's freelancing -- brick-and-mortar style.

Tune in to hear how Brian landed his first clients, how he priced his service, and how he scaled the business to remove himself from the day-to-day trash pickup.

With the decent pay, hours that fit around most day jobs, minimal start-up costs, and no prior experience necessary, it’s a side hustle success story that's worth checking out.

]]>Brian Winch calls it “America’s Simplest Business.”

What started as a side hustle way back in 1981 has now grown into a $650k a year operation.

So what does Brian do?

His company picks up litter from parking lots. Sadly, it's still an essential service (boo litterbugs!), but has very low startup costs and Brian says you can earn $30-$50 an hour doing this on the side.

What prompted Brian to pick up the phone and ask property management companies if he could handle their litter picking contracts?

“I decided I liked my job but I couldn’t see myself doing this for the rest of my life and I wanted more,” Brian said. In just a few months he was earning more part-time in this side hustle than he was at his full-time job.

It's freelancing -- brick-and-mortar style.

Tune in to hear how Brian landed his first clients, how he priced his service, and how he scaled the business to remove himself from the day-to-day trash pickup.

With the decent pay, hours that fit around most day jobs, minimal start-up costs, and no prior experience necessary, it’s a side hustle success story that's worth checking out.

]]>30:53nofull265: Instagram Marketing – How to Get More Followers and Customers on InstagramThu, 11 Jan 2018 10:00:00 +0000With a user base of 800 million people, there are enough potential customers for everyone on Instagram, regardless of your type of business.

Instagram is the first app I check in the morning, but I don't really use it for business. To help school me on this massive social media channel, I invited Allie McAdam on the show.

Allie is an Instagram strategist and the host of the Passion in Business podcast, which is primarily an Instagram marketing podcast.

Allie started off on the platform as many of us do, using it for personal pictures and keeping in touch with family and friends.

It wasn't until she started working for an MLM company and seeing some of the top earners leveraging Instagram for sales that she saw the potential for Instagram-specific marketing.

Allie started to reverse engineer what they were doing. She went from 300 followers to 3k in just six weeks, now has more than 10k followers, and teaches others how to do the same.

The first question everyone asks is, “Is there a market for my business on Instagram?”

“More often than not your audience is there. What matters is how you’re going to market to them,” Allie said.

Tune in to hear Allie explain how to find and market to your audience on Instagram, her top tips to increase your followers, and why Instagram might be the social media platform to take your business to the next level.

]]>With a user base of 800 million people, there are enough potential customers for everyone on Instagram, regardless of your type of business.

Instagram is the first app I check in the morning, but I don't really use it for business. To help school me on this massive social media channel, I invited Allie McAdam on the show.

Allie is an Instagram strategist and the host of the Passion in Business podcast, which is primarily an Instagram marketing podcast.

Allie started off on the platform as many of us do, using it for personal pictures and keeping in touch with family and friends.

It wasn't until she started working for an MLM company and seeing some of the top earners leveraging Instagram for sales that she saw the potential for Instagram-specific marketing.

Allie started to reverse engineer what they were doing. She went from 300 followers to 3k in just six weeks, now has more than 10k followers, and teaches others how to do the same.

The first question everyone asks is, “Is there a market for my business on Instagram?”

“More often than not your audience is there. What matters is how you’re going to market to them,” Allie said.

Tune in to hear Allie explain how to find and market to your audience on Instagram, her top tips to increase your followers, and why Instagram might be the social media platform to take your business to the next level.

]]>46:57nofull264: Challenge Marketing – How to Explode Your List and Revenue with Free ChallengesThu, 04 Jan 2018 10:00:00 +0000"I teach women how to get dressed in the morning."

But the 14 Day from Frustration to Functional Closet Challenge is just one piece of the puzzle, or one piece of the "customer success path," as she put it.

As the challenge wraps up, she invites participants to join her flagship course, and she's added a couple more upsells beyond that as well in response to customer feedback.

So how about results? Each time she runs a challenge she adds another $100k in revenue to her business!

There are some interesting and unusual techniques to her challenge marketing strategies, and definitely some scope to apply these techniques to your own business if you sell courses or any other service.

Tune in to hear how Kelly structures her challenges, how she gets people in the door, and how she converts free participants into paying customers.

But the 14 Day from Frustration to Functional Closet Challenge is just one piece of the puzzle, or one piece of the "customer success path," as she put it.

As the challenge wraps up, she invites participants to join her flagship course, and she's added a couple more upsells beyond that as well in response to customer feedback.

So how about results? Each time she runs a challenge she adds another $100k in revenue to her business!

There are some interesting and unusual techniques to her challenge marketing strategies, and definitely some scope to apply these techniques to your own business if you sell courses or any other service.

Tune in to hear how Kelly structures her challenges, how she gets people in the door, and how she converts free participants into paying customers.

]]>42:16nofull263: The Top 3 Amazon FBA Private Label Product Research Strategies for 2018 and BeyondThu, 28 Dec 2017 10:00:00 +0000It's no secret that Amazon FBA is one of the hottest side hustles going right now, and it shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

FBA is Fulfillment by Amazon, the program that allows you to list your own products for sale on Amazon, tap into their giant audience of customers, and have them handle all the shipping when orders come in.

The trick is figuring out which which products to sell, and that's where Greg Mercer comes in.

At that time, we talked about private label research and strategies for starting an FBA business. Since the landscape has changed a bit since then, I invited Greg back on the show to dive into how he's picking products today.

The 3 strategies we cover are:

Big demand / bad reviews.

Big sales / poor marketing.

New markets / immature listings.

Greg also breaks down the criteria he likes to see in new private label products, how Amazon ranks products in their internal algorithm, and how he successfully launches his new products quickly.

]]>It's no secret that Amazon FBA is one of the hottest side hustles going right now, and it shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

FBA is Fulfillment by Amazon, the program that allows you to list your own products for sale on Amazon, tap into their giant audience of customers, and have them handle all the shipping when orders come in.

The trick is figuring out which which products to sell, and that's where Greg Mercer comes in.

At that time, we talked about private label research and strategies for starting an FBA business. Since the landscape has changed a bit since then, I invited Greg back on the show to dive into how he's picking products today.

The 3 strategies we cover are:

Big demand / bad reviews.

Big sales / poor marketing.

New markets / immature listings.

Greg also breaks down the criteria he likes to see in new private label products, how Amazon ranks products in their internal algorithm, and how he successfully launches his new products quickly.

]]>48:45nofull262: The Most Common Website Mistakes (and How to Fix Them)Thu, 21 Dec 2017 10:00:00 +0000Is your website guilty of these common sins? How secure is your site, really?

WordPress is like the new toy you unwrap on Christmas morning -- you know it's going to be awesome, but there's some assembly required.

To break down some of the most common website mistakes, I invited my friend Anthony Tran on the show.

Anthony runs MarketingAccessPass.com, a web design and development agency, as well as AccessWP.com, a WordPress support company offering unlimited support for a low monthly subscription.

In this episode, we walk through how you can tighten up the security of your site, speed up your load times, and some quick changes that’ll improve your SEO and user experience.

Whether you’re new to WordPress or have been blogging for years, I think you’ll take something away from this episode as Anthony shares his tips, tools, and best practices from years of working online for himself and for clients.

Note: If you don't have a website up and running yet, my free video series will show you how to get online quickly and affordably.

]]>Is your website guilty of these common sins? How secure is your site, really?

WordPress is like the new toy you unwrap on Christmas morning -- you know it's going to be awesome, but there's some assembly required.

To break down some of the most common website mistakes, I invited my friend Anthony Tran on the show.

Anthony runs MarketingAccessPass.com, a web design and development agency, as well as AccessWP.com, a WordPress support company offering unlimited support for a low monthly subscription.

In this episode, we walk through how you can tighten up the security of your site, speed up your load times, and some quick changes that’ll improve your SEO and user experience.

Whether you’re new to WordPress or have been blogging for years, I think you’ll take something away from this episode as Anthony shares his tips, tools, and best practices from years of working online for himself and for clients.

Note: If you don't have a website up and running yet, my free video series will show you how to get online quickly and affordably.

]]>47:57nofull261: Health and Fitness for Busy Entrepreneurs - The Most Overlooked Productivity Hack?Thu, 14 Dec 2017 10:00:00 +0000I felt gross. I was tired from chasing a toddler around, out of shape, and fighting a series of frustrating injuries.

And I realized it was hurting my output at work. Building a business takes real energy and real brainpower, and I wasn't performing optimally because my body wasn't performing optimally.

Since we started working together, I've lost 5 pounds, gained strength, and generally feel more energized during the day. On the surface, investing 20 minutes in a workout seems like going backward; that's 20 minutes I should be working! But I've found it pays dividends in better energy the rest of the day and better sleep at night.

Since we started working together, I've lost 5 pounds, gained strength, and generally feel more energized during the day. On the surface, investing 20 minutes in a workout seems like going backward; that's 20 minutes I should be working! But I've found it pays dividends in better energy the rest of the day and better sleep at night.

He’s had some pretty impressive media exposure off the back of a Reddit AMA and is on track to sell more than $4 million worth of stuff in 2017.

What were the driving forces behind this accelerated growth?

“I wanted to make it a true business,” Ryan said.

He now has a team of 11 people working for him, has put processes in place to find more items in retail stores, has started buying at wholesale, and can now use his own time more efficiently to work on growing his business and finding expansion opportunities.

Ryan’s success is proof that retail arbitrage is still a viable side hustle. In this episode he explains what he’s learned over the last 3 years, and how the retail arbitrage landscape has changed for new sellers.

Tune in to hear Ryan explain how he grew his business into a multi-million-dollar operation, how he grew his team and developed processes to scale up, and what he’s focusing on in 2018.

]]>A lot has changed in Ryan's "buy low, sell high" business built on Amazon's FBA program.

He’s had some pretty impressive media exposure off the back of a Reddit AMA and is on track to sell more than $4 million worth of stuff in 2017.

What were the driving forces behind this accelerated growth?

“I wanted to make it a true business,” Ryan said.

He now has a team of 11 people working for him, has put processes in place to find more items in retail stores, has started buying at wholesale, and can now use his own time more efficiently to work on growing his business and finding expansion opportunities.

Ryan’s success is proof that retail arbitrage is still a viable side hustle. In this episode he explains what he’s learned over the last 3 years, and how the retail arbitrage landscape has changed for new sellers.

Tune in to hear Ryan explain how he grew his business into a multi-million-dollar operation, how he grew his team and developed processes to scale up, and what he’s focusing on in 2018.

]]>45:44nofull259: YouTube Roundtable: How 3 Video Creators Built an Audience and a Business on YouTubeThu, 30 Nov 2017 10:00:00 +0000This week’s show is a roundtable episode on the topic of YouTube, and specifically how 3 different channel hosts have gone about growing their presence and profits on the YouTube platform.

They each raise some interesting points as they have very different approaches to how they publish content and monetize their channels, proving there are many ways to turn a YouTube channel into a side hustle or a full-time business.

Jon uses what he calls a “spray and pray" strategy for content creation. Pete’s DIY videos are edited down from 3-5 hours of footage to just 8-12 minutes and he releases one a month, while Matt publishes once a week (usually interviews) to, “try to get the weekend crowd.”

On the monetization side, Jon has opted to go ad-free for a better viewer experience and earns $4-5k per month from affiliate income part-time.

Pete has taken a different approach making around $1400 a month from YouTube ads, but has several other income streams including courses, affiliate offers, sponsorship deals, website ad revenue, and direct donations.

Matt makes $10k a month funneling his subscribers to his money-making videos selling a digital marketing course, and $3k a month from YouTube ad revenue.

With more than 450k subscribers between them, this episode is packed with actionable tips to grow and monetize a YouTube channel that has worked for Jon, Pete, and Matt.

Listen in for actionable advice on how to grow and monetize your own YouTube channel.

]]>This week’s show is a roundtable episode on the topic of YouTube, and specifically how 3 different channel hosts have gone about growing their presence and profits on the YouTube platform.

They each raise some interesting points as they have very different approaches to how they publish content and monetize their channels, proving there are many ways to turn a YouTube channel into a side hustle or a full-time business.

Jon uses what he calls a “spray and pray" strategy for content creation. Pete’s DIY videos are edited down from 3-5 hours of footage to just 8-12 minutes and he releases one a month, while Matt publishes once a week (usually interviews) to, “try to get the weekend crowd.”

On the monetization side, Jon has opted to go ad-free for a better viewer experience and earns $4-5k per month from affiliate income part-time.

Pete has taken a different approach making around $1400 a month from YouTube ads, but has several other income streams including courses, affiliate offers, sponsorship deals, website ad revenue, and direct donations.

Matt makes $10k a month funneling his subscribers to his money-making videos selling a digital marketing course, and $3k a month from YouTube ad revenue.

With more than 450k subscribers between them, this episode is packed with actionable tips to grow and monetize a YouTube channel that has worked for Jon, Pete, and Matt.

Listen in for actionable advice on how to grow and monetize your own YouTube channel.

Jefferson is also the host of the Mobile Home Investors podcast, so it’s fair to say he knows this niche inside and out.

The mobile home park niche doesn’t fit the typical real estate guidelines. It’s a shrinking market and offers some interesting and unique investment opportunities if you know where to look.

In addition to the shrinking supply, the tenant turnover is lower than other real estate niches, and most tenants own their own homes -- meaning lower maintenance costs.

Tune in to hear how Jefferson went from purchasing his first park after receiving 58 "no's" from banks when trying to raise the capital, to forming Park Street Partners and boasting a rapidly growing portfolio with more $50 million invested in mobile home parks.

]]>It's like owning a parking lot, Jefferson Lilly explained. And you can earn 20% cash on cash returns too.

That got my attention, though those returns are coming from a surprising real estate niche: mobile home parks.

Jefferson Lilly is a mobile home park investment expert, educator, and industry consultant who has been featured in the New York Times, Bloomberg Magazine, and on the ‘Real Money’ television show.

Through his company Park Street Partners, they currently own about $50 million worth of mobile home parks coast-to-coast.

Jefferson is also the host of the Mobile Home Investors podcast, so it’s fair to say he knows this niche inside and out.

The mobile home park niche doesn’t fit the typical real estate guidelines. It’s a shrinking market and offers some interesting and unique investment opportunities if you know where to look.

In addition to the shrinking supply, the tenant turnover is lower than other real estate niches, and most tenants own their own homes -- meaning lower maintenance costs.

Tune in to hear how Jefferson went from purchasing his first park after receiving 58 "no's" from banks when trying to raise the capital, to forming Park Street Partners and boasting a rapidly growing portfolio with more $50 million invested in mobile home parks.

Michelle’s online journey started in the summer of 2011 when she decided to start blogging about paying off her student debts, “I didn’t know what blogs were at the time… I literally didn’t know that you could make money with a blog,” she said looking back.

It was when she made her first $100 six months later with a sponsored post that she knew she wanted to build an online business.

“It became super addicting,” Michelle said.

Fast-forward just two years and Michelle had become a full-time blogger making money through affiliate marketing sponsored posts, working as a freelance staff writer and selling display advertising.

She started to focus on affiliate marketing, and with her most profitable post making more than $400k to-date it's fair to say she's nailed the right way to do affiliate marketing.

The secret to her success?

Listening to her audience and providing relevant content that solves a pain point.

Sounds simple, right?

Tune in to hear Michelle explain how she finds the right affiliate products to promote to her audience, as well as her tips to maximize conversions, increase your social media following, diversify your traffic sources, and much more.

Michelle’s online journey started in the summer of 2011 when she decided to start blogging about paying off her student debts, “I didn’t know what blogs were at the time… I literally didn’t know that you could make money with a blog,” she said looking back.

It was when she made her first $100 six months later with a sponsored post that she knew she wanted to build an online business.

“It became super addicting,” Michelle said.

Fast-forward just two years and Michelle had become a full-time blogger making money through affiliate marketing sponsored posts, working as a freelance staff writer and selling display advertising.

She started to focus on affiliate marketing, and with her most profitable post making more than $400k to-date it's fair to say she's nailed the right way to do affiliate marketing.

The secret to her success?

Listening to her audience and providing relevant content that solves a pain point.

Sounds simple, right?

Tune in to hear Michelle explain how she finds the right affiliate products to promote to her audience, as well as her tips to maximize conversions, increase your social media following, diversify your traffic sources, and much more.

]]>38:31nofull256: Bootstrapped Business Idea Brain Dump: 8 Business Models You Can Borrow w/ Zero (or Better than Zero) Startup CostsThu, 09 Nov 2017 10:00:00 +0000In my annual member survey, one of the 3 most common obstacles I hear is the money needed to start a business. As in, "I don't have enough money to start a business."

It's kind of a chicken vs. egg problem: you need money to start the business and you need the business to earn the money!

But the truth is that most side hustles these days don't take a ton of cash to get off the ground. In fact, most of the businesses I've started have cost less than $500 to start.

In this episode I'll share 8 business models that have no startup costs, and one of them even has a "better than zero" startup cost -- meaning you can get paid to acquire your inventory.

The 8 Models:

The Perceived Value Plan

The Dealmaker Model

The Connector Email Model

The Curator Email Model

One Man’s Trash is a Another Man’s Treasure

Repackaging

The Pay for Performance Model

The Agency Model

Tune in to hear my examples of real businesses making it work under each of those models. It's sure to get your creative juices flowing on what kind of side hustle you could start!

Stick around to the end of the show and I'll also share the actual startup costs for all of my businesses over the last 20 years.

]]>23:38nofull255: Finding Your Sweet Spot: How Talking About Air Conditioning Turned Into a 5-Figure a Month Side HustleThu, 02 Nov 2017 09:00:00 +0000By day, Bryan Orr helps runs an air conditioning company in Central Florida, and by night he’s a father of 9 -- yet somehow he's found the time to build his HVAC School podcast into a 5-figure a month business in less than a year.

And it might sounds like an overnight success, but Bryan's actually been side hustling for quite a while, mostly in the podcasting and freelance audio production space.

Tasked with training technicians at his day job, he had the idea to put it into an on-demand audio format, and that's where he found his side hustle sweet spot.

It was on a whim he decided to publish the content online and make it available to a wider audience. “In the process it just exploded, I never thought there would be an audience like the audience that I found,” Bryan said.

With 1000 downloads in the first 48 hours and synergy with his day job, Bryan started allocating more time to his show.

As his audience grew he started negotiating sponsorship deals with large companies in the HVAC niche.

Less than a year into this new side hustle, he's built an email list of over 7500 subscribers, generated more than 500,000 podcast downloads, and is earning $11k a month in sponsorship revenue.

Tune in to hear how Bryan promoted his show to gain that initial traction, how he worked with influencers in his niche for extra exposure, and how he secured sponsors to monetize his show.

]]>By day, Bryan Orr helps runs an air conditioning company in Central Florida, and by night he’s a father of 9 -- yet somehow he's found the time to build his HVAC School podcast into a 5-figure a month business in less than a year.

And it might sounds like an overnight success, but Bryan's actually been side hustling for quite a while, mostly in the podcasting and freelance audio production space.

Tasked with training technicians at his day job, he had the idea to put it into an on-demand audio format, and that's where he found his side hustle sweet spot.

It was on a whim he decided to publish the content online and make it available to a wider audience. “In the process it just exploded, I never thought there would be an audience like the audience that I found,” Bryan said.

With 1000 downloads in the first 48 hours and synergy with his day job, Bryan started allocating more time to his show.

As his audience grew he started negotiating sponsorship deals with large companies in the HVAC niche.

Less than a year into this new side hustle, he's built an email list of over 7500 subscribers, generated more than 500,000 podcast downloads, and is earning $11k a month in sponsorship revenue.

Tune in to hear how Bryan promoted his show to gain that initial traction, how he worked with influencers in his niche for extra exposure, and how he secured sponsors to monetize his show.

]]>43:55nofull254: Freelance to Freedom: From $30k a Year to $30k in a DayThu, 26 Oct 2017 09:00:00 +0000“You have a skill, but you’re not using it correctly."

That the tough love advice Vincent Pugliese's father gave him.

Vincent was working what he thought was his dream job as a photojournalist. He'd just won the most prestigious award in his industry (International Sports Photographer of the Year), and he and his wife Elizabeth had a baby on the way.

Yet the newspaper job didn't pay well. With the impending arrival of their son, Vincent took a hard look at his financial picture: he was in his mid-30s, 6-figures in debt, and earning $15 an hour.

Not great.

Something had to change, and something did.

Four years later, the family was debt free and self-employed, thanks to the success of their freelance photography side hustle.

I met Vincent at Podcast Movement and invited him on the show to share his inspiring and relate-able story. With a growing trend toward freelance workers, his transition is one many people will need to make over the next few years.

With his newfound time freedom, Vincent has kept busy with a number of new projects including his upcoming book Freelance to Freedom, and an online course teaching parents how to take better sports pictures of their kids.

(Even though Vincent had no "audience" of his own to sell to, the course did over $30k on launch day, giving us the hook for this episode.)

Tune in to hear how he and his wife got it done and how you can apply the same strategies to the skills on your own resume.

]]>“You have a skill, but you’re not using it correctly."

That the tough love advice Vincent Pugliese's father gave him.

Vincent was working what he thought was his dream job as a photojournalist. He'd just won the most prestigious award in his industry (International Sports Photographer of the Year), and he and his wife Elizabeth had a baby on the way.

Yet the newspaper job didn't pay well. With the impending arrival of their son, Vincent took a hard look at his financial picture: he was in his mid-30s, 6-figures in debt, and earning $15 an hour.

Not great.

Something had to change, and something did.

Four years later, the family was debt free and self-employed, thanks to the success of their freelance photography side hustle.

I met Vincent at Podcast Movement and invited him on the show to share his inspiring and relate-able story. With a growing trend toward freelance workers, his transition is one many people will need to make over the next few years.

With his newfound time freedom, Vincent has kept busy with a number of new projects including his upcoming book Freelance to Freedom, and an online course teaching parents how to take better sports pictures of their kids.

(Even though Vincent had no "audience" of his own to sell to, the course did over $30k on launch day, giving us the hook for this episode.)

Tune in to hear how he and his wife got it done and how you can apply the same strategies to the skills on your own resume.

But she eventually did, and it turned out to be a really smart move. Together with her husband Cressel, they paid off $93k in debt in less than 2 years, setting themselves up for a life of “financial flexibility.”

They did it through a combination of conscious spending, creative side hustles, and having a clear goal in mind. And perhaps what’s more exciting is what that new time freedom has allowed: starting a family, starting new businesses, and most recently even “retiring” Cressel from his engineering job.

In this inspiring episode, Kim and Cressel break down their path to financial freedom, which I think will get your gears turning on how to do the same.

]]>Quit my job? “That’s stupid,” Kim Anderson said.

But she eventually did, and it turned out to be a really smart move. Together with her husband Cressel, they paid off $93k in debt in less than 2 years, setting themselves up for a life of “financial flexibility.”

They did it through a combination of conscious spending, creative side hustles, and having a clear goal in mind. And perhaps what’s more exciting is what that new time freedom has allowed: starting a family, starting new businesses, and most recently even “retiring” Cressel from his engineering job.

In this inspiring episode, Kim and Cressel break down their path to financial freedom, which I think will get your gears turning on how to do the same.

Although he'd been blogging for years, his traffic and revenue had kind of stagnated.

Inspired by the success of The Penny Hoarder using a similar strategy in a similar niche, Deacon decided to jump in and throw $1000 toward his new Facebook Ads experiment. Within a month he'd effectively doubled his investment.

Ten months later he's built a beautiful machine that combines compelling helpful content, affiliate relationships, and the massive reach of Facebook.

In this episode, you'll hear the type of content Deacon has found most profitable to promote, the types of ads he runs, and how he's able to get his costs per click down to around $0.05

]]>Would you trade $1000 for $2000? How about $10,000 for $18,000?

If you're anything like me, I'll make those trades all day long!

Well, Deacon Hayes is doing exactly that every month through his blog, Facebook ads, and affiliate marketing.

Although he'd been blogging for years, his traffic and revenue had kind of stagnated.

Inspired by the success of The Penny Hoarder using a similar strategy in a similar niche, Deacon decided to jump in and throw $1000 toward his new Facebook Ads experiment. Within a month he'd effectively doubled his investment.

Ten months later he's built a beautiful machine that combines compelling helpful content, affiliate relationships, and the massive reach of Facebook.

In this episode, you'll hear the type of content Deacon has found most profitable to promote, the types of ads he runs, and how he's able to get his costs per click down to around $0.05

]]>41:18nofull251: When a Side Hustle Fails - Lessons, Pivots, and Next Steps from a Less-Than-Successful Side ProjectFri, 06 Oct 2017 09:00:00 +0000Dustin Lien from StrategicSauce.com reached out to me with an interesting pitch for an episode.

Dustin had experienced a side hustle failure and wanted to know if the Side Hustle audience would be interested in hearing his story.

I threw the idea out to the Side Hustle Facebook Group and received an overwhelming amount of feedback saying, “Yes,” they wanted to hear the “other side” of a side hustle when it fails.

In this episode Dustin lifts the lid on a business he invested a large chunk of time and money into, only to pull the plug on it a year and a half later.

He designed a great product that solved a pain point for people in the fitness community.

So, what went wrong?

Tune in to hear exactly what did and didn’t work for Dustin, and why he decided to throw in the towel on this project.

Dustin shares what he would do differently if he had to start over, as well as what he's working on today. He's loaded with valuable insight for anyone starting a new venture.

]]>37:38nofull249: SaaS Case Study: How Snappa Bootstrapped Their Way from Idea to $33k MRR in 2 YearsThu, 28 Sep 2017 09:00:00 +0000The holy grail of side hustle business models is software, right? Built it once and sell it over and over again for almost zero incremental cost!

Having built the online graphic design tool Snappa to $33k in monthly recurring revenue in 2 years, Christopher Gimmer rounds out our "recurring revenue" theme for the month.

The software as a service aims to help bloggers and content creators make perfectly sized social media graphics or blog images easily and professionally. “Create online graphics in a snap,” the tagline says.

The cool do-it-yourself tool is sold on a freemium or monthly/annual subscription model.

“I just wanted to know whether people were having the same issues I was having,” Christopher said, talking about the hassle he experienced creating quick and professional looking social media and blog graphics.

This is the fourth episode in this series of recurring revenue shows. If you’ve missed any of the previous episodes, be sure to check out:

In this episode, Christopher shares how he validated his idea, successfully launched his new tool just months later and generated $2-3k in the first week, and grew the business to where it is today.

]]>The holy grail of side hustle business models is software, right? Built it once and sell it over and over again for almost zero incremental cost!

Having built the online graphic design tool Snappa to $33k in monthly recurring revenue in 2 years, Christopher Gimmer rounds out our "recurring revenue" theme for the month.

The software as a service aims to help bloggers and content creators make perfectly sized social media graphics or blog images easily and professionally. “Create online graphics in a snap,” the tagline says.

The cool do-it-yourself tool is sold on a freemium or monthly/annual subscription model.

“I just wanted to know whether people were having the same issues I was having,” Christopher said, talking about the hassle he experienced creating quick and professional looking social media and blog graphics.

This is the fourth episode in this series of recurring revenue shows. If you’ve missed any of the previous episodes, be sure to check out:

In this episode, Christopher shares how he validated his idea, successfully launched his new tool just months later and generated $2-3k in the first week, and grew the business to where it is today.

]]>38:31nofull248: Scaling Up a Service Business: From Idea to $400k in Monthly Recurring Revenue (in Under 3 Years)Thu, 21 Sep 2017 09:00:00 +0000Three years ago Design Pickle didn't exist. It wasn't even an idea in founder Russ Perry's head yet.

Back in 2014 Russ was running a creative agency, but he started to hate everything about it. “I felt like I was in a prison of my own creation,” he said.

By January 2015, he'd shut down his agency and started working as a freelancer. Not wanting to build a similar prison again, he sought out a different business model -- one with a simpler service offering that was designed to scale.

From taking on a friend as his first client to now completing more than 800 design jobs a day, it’s been an incredibly quick ascension and a great example of how to scale a service business.

Back in 2014 Russ was running a creative agency, but he started to hate everything about it. “I felt like I was in a prison of my own creation,” he said.

By January 2015, he'd shut down his agency and started working as a freelancer. Not wanting to build a similar prison again, he sought out a different business model -- one with a simpler service offering that was designed to scale.

From taking on a friend as his first client to now completing more than 800 design jobs a day, it’s been an incredibly quick ascension and a great example of how to scale a service business.

Tune in to hear how Russ grew his business from zero to $410k+ in monthly recurring revenue in less than 3 years.

We cover his marketing strategies, his hiring best practices, and what Design Pickle does to keep customers coming back month after month.

]]>44:27nofull247: How To Shortcut Your Financial Freedom with Short-Term RentalsThu, 14 Sep 2017 09:00:00 +0000Zeona McIntyre is earning $12-18k a month through her portfolio of vacation rental properties and her "co-hosting" service for other property owners.

All this has afforded Zeona financial independence at a very young age, as she built her operation largely by piggybacking on the growing popularity of Airbnb (get $40 off your first trip!).

She first became aware of Airbnb and the potential to earn some extra revenue back in 2011. She was in massage school at the time, but a friend of hers in New York subletted his apartment on Airbnb to the tune of $50k for the year -- all while traveling full-time.

“I couldn’t ignore it from then; I started right away,” Zeona said.

She started by subletting a room in her apartment, then her whole apartment, and now owns five rental properties and manages or "co-hosts" another 15-20 properties on the behalf of her clients.

With a small team, some smart decisions, and some online tools, Zeona now manages her business from her home in Boulder, Colorado relatively hands-off.

This week, tune in to hear how Zeona chooses vacation rental properties, how she calculates the potential ROI, and how you can get started in this location independent side hustle today with just a spare room in your home.

]]>Zeona McIntyre is earning $12-18k a month through her portfolio of vacation rental properties and her "co-hosting" service for other property owners.

All this has afforded Zeona financial independence at a very young age, as she built her operation largely by piggybacking on the growing popularity of Airbnb (get $40 off your first trip!).

She first became aware of Airbnb and the potential to earn some extra revenue back in 2011. She was in massage school at the time, but a friend of hers in New York subletted his apartment on Airbnb to the tune of $50k for the year -- all while traveling full-time.

“I couldn’t ignore it from then; I started right away,” Zeona said.

She started by subletting a room in her apartment, then her whole apartment, and now owns five rental properties and manages or "co-hosts" another 15-20 properties on the behalf of her clients.

With a small team, some smart decisions, and some online tools, Zeona now manages her business from her home in Boulder, Colorado relatively hands-off.

This week, tune in to hear how Zeona chooses vacation rental properties, how she calculates the potential ROI, and how you can get started in this location independent side hustle today with just a spare room in your home.

]]>41:07nofull246: How to Start a Subscription Box Service: From Spare Bedroom to $15k in Monthly Recurring RevenueThu, 07 Sep 2017 09:00:00 +0000From the spare bedroom to $15k in monthly recurring revenue, Sam Gonzalez has grown the subscription style service UrbaneBox.com (affiliate link) all on the side from his day job as a police officer.

He noticed his wardrobe was getting pretty outdated and with family and work life, he didn’t have any time (or desire, really) to go shopping. So he decided to do something about it and create an online subscription box business with a cool value proposition: $120 worth of designer clothes for $60.

In this episode Sam talks through the steps he took from building his website, pitching suppliers, experimenting with different pricing models, and outsourcing the order fulfillment.

He’s used a combination of AdWords, social media promotion, collaborating with other bloggers and YouTube influencers, and an interesting Facebook “hack” to rapidly grow his business.

Tune in to hear how Sam went from idea to 6-figures in 3 years, from packing and shipping his first order from his spare bedroom to a business that now does $15k in monthly recurring revenue.

]]>From the spare bedroom to $15k in monthly recurring revenue, Sam Gonzalez has grown the subscription style service UrbaneBox.com (affiliate link) all on the side from his day job as a police officer.

He noticed his wardrobe was getting pretty outdated and with family and work life, he didn’t have any time (or desire, really) to go shopping. So he decided to do something about it and create an online subscription box business with a cool value proposition: $120 worth of designer clothes for $60.

In this episode Sam talks through the steps he took from building his website, pitching suppliers, experimenting with different pricing models, and outsourcing the order fulfillment.

He’s used a combination of AdWords, social media promotion, collaborating with other bloggers and YouTube influencers, and an interesting Facebook “hack” to rapidly grow his business.

Tune in to hear how Sam went from idea to 6-figures in 3 years, from packing and shipping his first order from his spare bedroom to a business that now does $15k in monthly recurring revenue.

]]>38:02nofull245: Network Marketing, Imposter Syndrome, My Side Hustle Mistakes, and More: 20 Questions with NickThu, 31 Aug 2017 09:00:00 +0000It’s time to dive into the ol' listener mailbag and answer a few questions in this week’s edition of The Side Hustle Show.

It’s been 6 months since the last Q&A show I did (where does the time go??) and I’ve had quite a few interesting questions come in since then. I picked 20 to talk through in today’s show.

Like this format? This is the 4th installment of "20 Questions" so feel free to go back and binge on the older ones too:

Tune in to hear my responses to those questions and a dozen more below.

]]>38:52nofull244: Merch by Amazon Marketing: How to Drive Traffic and Sales to Your T-Shirt DesignsThu, 24 Aug 2017 09:00:00 +0000Chris Green is one of the foremost advocates for the side hustle lifestyle. He has 10+ years’ experience as an Amazon seller, author, software provider to others involved in the Amazon ecosystem, and most recently as a t-shirt designer selling shirts on the Merch by Amazon platform.

Chris calls Merch by Amazon “the best side hustle out there right now.” With no upfront capital, no shipping or returns, no customer service, and no risk, it’s certainly one of the easiest side hustles to get started with.

If you’re just getting started with Merch, Elaine Heney (who made $50k selling shirts last year) shared how to sign up and get your first t-shirts for sale on the Merch platform back on episode 216.

Chris picks up where Elaine left off and goes into detail sharing some of his best tips for optimizing your listing, where he finds ideas for t-shirt designs and a few of the methods he uses to market his shirts.

Tune in to hear some the unique and interesting ways Chris comes up with t-shirt designs ideas, as well as how he markets them through paid ads and organic outreach.

]]>Chris Green is one of the foremost advocates for the side hustle lifestyle. He has 10+ years’ experience as an Amazon seller, author, software provider to others involved in the Amazon ecosystem, and most recently as a t-shirt designer selling shirts on the Merch by Amazon platform.

Chris calls Merch by Amazon “the best side hustle out there right now.” With no upfront capital, no shipping or returns, no customer service, and no risk, it’s certainly one of the easiest side hustles to get started with.

If you’re just getting started with Merch, Elaine Heney (who made $50k selling shirts last year) shared how to sign up and get your first t-shirts for sale on the Merch platform back on episode 216.

Chris picks up where Elaine left off and goes into detail sharing some of his best tips for optimizing your listing, where he finds ideas for t-shirt designs and a few of the methods he uses to market his shirts.

Tune in to hear some the unique and interesting ways Chris comes up with t-shirt designs ideas, as well as how he markets them through paid ads and organic outreach.

]]>43:56nofull243: Side Hustle Coaching: I've Got Some Traction, Now What?Thu, 17 Aug 2017 09:00:00 +0000Sarah Miller is still in college (and plays soccer for her school) but that hasn't stopped her from starting a pretty cool side hustle: painting custom pet portraits.

She's done 300 paintings so far!

But the business isn't without its challenges. She'd like to raise her rates, expand her marketing efforts to land new clients, and figure out how to make her work less of a time-for-money tradeoff.

To help me brainstorm some ideas for Sarah, I invited Don the Idea Guy back on the program to join us on a call.

As you might remember, Don is a creative genius and in this episode he definitely doesn't disappoint. Together we walk through a dozen different ways Sarah could take her operation to the next level and open up new income streams.

Even if your business has nothing to do with painting wiener dogs, I think this conversation will get your gears turning because the broader strategies can apply to lots of different business models.

Among the suggestions:

Raise prices for the custom work.

Create off-the-shelf prints for the most popular breeds (from the library of work Sarah's already done).

Use print-on-demand marketplaces to instantly expand inventory and sales options.

Her various upsell and cross-sell opportunities.

Partner with influential pet bloggers and Facebook group administrators.

]]>Sarah Miller is still in college (and plays soccer for her school) but that hasn't stopped her from starting a pretty cool side hustle: painting custom pet portraits.

She's done 300 paintings so far!

But the business isn't without its challenges. She'd like to raise her rates, expand her marketing efforts to land new clients, and figure out how to make her work less of a time-for-money tradeoff.

To help me brainstorm some ideas for Sarah, I invited Don the Idea Guy back on the program to join us on a call.

As you might remember, Don is a creative genius and in this episode he definitely doesn't disappoint. Together we walk through a dozen different ways Sarah could take her operation to the next level and open up new income streams.

Even if your business has nothing to do with painting wiener dogs, I think this conversation will get your gears turning because the broader strategies can apply to lots of different business models.

Among the suggestions:

Raise prices for the custom work.

Create off-the-shelf prints for the most popular breeds (from the library of work Sarah's already done).

Use print-on-demand marketplaces to instantly expand inventory and sales options.

Her various upsell and cross-sell opportunities.

Partner with influential pet bloggers and Facebook group administrators.

]]>48:41nofull242: Amazon FBA Europe: The Next E-Commerce FrontierThu, 10 Aug 2017 09:00:00 +0000John Cavendish of FBA Frontiers started his Amazon FBA business three years ago and has become an advocate for the e-commerce and FBA scene in Europe.

If you already have experience with Amazon FBA in the US, expanding into Europe is easier than you’re probably thinking and opens up a much wider customer base.

John says that Europe is about five years behind the US in terms of growth so it’s on that steep rise, and with “double the customers and half the competition,” it was a side hustle opportunity I was intrigued to learn more about.

You don’t need to be based in the UK, have a UK-based business, or be fluent in any other languages either.

In this episode, John talks through the few simple steps it takes to get started selling on the European Amazon marketplaces.

He outlines his product research process, how the EU bestselling ranks differ to the US, his supplier best practices, the tool he made to calculate profitability, and more.

Tune in to hear how John has gone from a $5000 investment just three years ago to a selling hundreds of products daily across the UK, German, French, Spanish, and Italian Amazon marketplaces.

]]>John Cavendish of FBA Frontiers started his Amazon FBA business three years ago and has become an advocate for the e-commerce and FBA scene in Europe.

If you already have experience with Amazon FBA in the US, expanding into Europe is easier than you’re probably thinking and opens up a much wider customer base.

John says that Europe is about five years behind the US in terms of growth so it’s on that steep rise, and with “double the customers and half the competition,” it was a side hustle opportunity I was intrigued to learn more about.

You don’t need to be based in the UK, have a UK-based business, or be fluent in any other languages either.

In this episode, John talks through the few simple steps it takes to get started selling on the European Amazon marketplaces.

He outlines his product research process, how the EU bestselling ranks differ to the US, his supplier best practices, the tool he made to calculate profitability, and more.

Tune in to hear how John has gone from a $5000 investment just three years ago to a selling hundreds of products daily across the UK, German, French, Spanish, and Italian Amazon marketplaces.

]]>34:33nofull241: Reverse Engineer your Dream Job: How a Struggling Songwriter Built a Multiple 6-Figure Business Doing What She LovesThu, 03 Aug 2017 09:00:00 +0000Over the last decade, Cathy Heller has earned hundreds of thousands of dollars from her music and helping other musicians license their songs.

In fact, you've probably heard some of her music without realizing it. Songs of hers have been featured in ads for huge brands, like McDonald’s, Walmart, Kellogg’s, as well as many popular TV shows.

Today, the mother of 3 balances family, her art, her agency, her online course, and her new Don't Keep Your Day Job podcast, where she interviews other entrepreneurs, artists, and influencers.

Cathy's story is an inspiring one, and it follows a familiar trajectory: freelancer to agency to product.

When she moved to LA to be a rockstar, she didn't know where it would lead. That didn't pan out, but she landed at something perhaps even more fulfilling. She called it reverse engineering her dream job, and thinks other people can do the same.

Tune in to hear how Cathy walked The Hustler's Path from freelancer to agency to product, and how you can apply her ideas and tactics to find your dream job.

]]>Over the last decade, Cathy Heller has earned hundreds of thousands of dollars from her music and helping other musicians license their songs.

In fact, you've probably heard some of her music without realizing it. Songs of hers have been featured in ads for huge brands, like McDonald’s, Walmart, Kellogg’s, as well as many popular TV shows.

Today, the mother of 3 balances family, her art, her agency, her online course, and her new Don't Keep Your Day Job podcast, where she interviews other entrepreneurs, artists, and influencers.

Cathy's story is an inspiring one, and it follows a familiar trajectory: freelancer to agency to product.

When she moved to LA to be a rockstar, she didn't know where it would lead. That didn't pan out, but she landed at something perhaps even more fulfilling. She called it reverse engineering her dream job, and thinks other people can do the same.

Tune in to hear how Cathy walked The Hustler's Path from freelancer to agency to product, and how you can apply her ideas and tactics to find your dream job.

]]>42:38nofull240: Why a Facebook Group Should be Part of Your Marketing StrategyThu, 27 Jul 2017 09:00:00 +0000Teresa Greenway is a mother of 10 who went from working part-time in a bakery to making $5k a month doing what she loves – baking and teaching others how to bake.

Since then her business and revenue have grown faster than a loaf of her sourdough bread. Teresa earned $1k in the month she released her first Udemy course in April 2015, and it was a life-changing moment. She went on to earn $20k in her first year, and now consistently brings in $4-5k a month.

Teresa did all of this will little to no promotion or marketing. Tune in to hear how she grew her Facebook group so fast, why she decided to start selling courses on Udemy, and how she also uses YouTube and ebooks to drive traffic to her courses and group.

]]>Teresa Greenway is a mother of 10 who went from working part-time in a bakery to making $5k a month doing what she loves – baking and teaching others how to bake.

Since then her business and revenue have grown faster than a loaf of her sourdough bread. Teresa earned $1k in the month she released her first Udemy course in April 2015, and it was a life-changing moment. She went on to earn $20k in her first year, and now consistently brings in $4-5k a month.

Teresa did all of this will little to no promotion or marketing. Tune in to hear how she grew her Facebook group so fast, why she decided to start selling courses on Udemy, and how she also uses YouTube and ebooks to drive traffic to her courses and group.

]]>31:43no239: How to Cultivate Creativity Like an InventorThu, 20 Jul 2017 09:00:00 +0000You can be a creator or a consumer, but it’s the creators that get paid.

Stash holds six patents related to products in the baseball and softball world, as well as footwear safety. She’s worked on these products as a side hustle while working full-time at the University of Virginia.

David Fedewa is a serial inventor who has taken the product licensing route as described by Stephen Key in episode 173 to earn passive income from his product ideas.

Tune in to hear how they come with ideas, how to unleash the creativity in your own head, and what to do with those ideas once you have them.

]]>You can be a creator or a consumer, but it’s the creators that get paid.

Stash holds six patents related to products in the baseball and softball world, as well as footwear safety. She’s worked on these products as a side hustle while working full-time at the University of Virginia.

David Fedewa is a serial inventor who has taken the product licensing route as described by Stephen Key in episode 173 to earn passive income from his product ideas.

Tune in to hear how they come with ideas, how to unleash the creativity in your own head, and what to do with those ideas once you have them.

]]>30:23no238: 10 Foundational Hustle Habits to Improve Your Health, Wealth, and HappinessThu, 13 Jul 2017 09:00:00 +0000As the author of more than 70 books, Steve "S.J." Scott is one of the most productive and disciplined people I know.

His latest title, Habit Stacking, became a Wall Street Journal Bestseller and served as the inspiration for this episode.

This time though we're diving into a few of the habits that allow Steve to continually drive his business forward, and lead a healthier and happier life. Plus, you'll learn why we think they're important and how you can apply them in your own life.

The 10 habits we cover are:

Tracking your time

Reviewing your goals daily

Writing down the tasks you got done

Fixing your "broken windows"

Wearing a step-tracking device

Keeping a food diary

Researching one side hustle

Breaking down a big project into actionable steps

Following an evening shutdown routine

Practicing mindfulness

As you can see, they're not all directly business-related, but most take 5 minutes or less and are designed to increase your productivity, reduce stress, prioritize your workload, and help you find a healthy work-life balance.

Tune in to hear how Steve and I incorporate these habits into our daily routines (or plan to, in my case). As you'll see in the links section below, there are a lot of books, apps, and resources mentioned.

]]>As the author of more than 70 books, Steve "S.J." Scott is one of the most productive and disciplined people I know.

His latest title, Habit Stacking, became a Wall Street Journal Bestseller and served as the inspiration for this episode.

This time though we're diving into a few of the habits that allow Steve to continually drive his business forward, and lead a healthier and happier life. Plus, you'll learn why we think they're important and how you can apply them in your own life.

The 10 habits we cover are:

Tracking your time

Reviewing your goals daily

Writing down the tasks you got done

Fixing your "broken windows"

Wearing a step-tracking device

Keeping a food diary

Researching one side hustle

Breaking down a big project into actionable steps

Following an evening shutdown routine

Practicing mindfulness

As you can see, they're not all directly business-related, but most take 5 minutes or less and are designed to increase your productivity, reduce stress, prioritize your workload, and help you find a healthy work-life balance.

Tune in to hear how Steve and I incorporate these habits into our daily routines (or plan to, in my case). As you'll see in the links section below, there are a lot of books, apps, and resources mentioned.

]]>49:59no237: How to Quickly Brainstorm and Validate Business Ideas, with Noah KaganThu, 06 Jul 2017 09:00:00 +0000Noah Kagan is Chief Sumo and founder of Sumo.com and AppSumo.com. He blogs about his personal and business experiences at OkDork.com, and his new podcast is called Noah Kagan Presents.

Noah has built up a number of successful businesses and is always toying with new ideas or looking for the next big business opportunity, so he was the perfect person to brainstorm with.

At the end of nearly every episode of The Side Hustle Show, I ask my guests for their #1 tip for Side Hustle Nation. There’s always a great variety of responses, and I wanted to take some time today to go through some of my favorites from the past 50-ish interviews.

I first did this for episode 50, which was my first-ever solo podcast recording, and then again in episode 124 and episode 177. If you like this short-and-sweet meta-style show, be sure to check out those ones from the archives as well.

And even though my primary motivation is to extract helpful tactics for you, the listener, I can't help but learn from my guests as well. You never know when inspiration will strike or where you'll hear the one insight that has a huge impact.

These episodes are a lot of fun to put together, and give me an excuse to revisit some of my favorite moments and wise words from the show.

From the last 49 guests, the 3 most common #1 tips I heard were:

Get started.

Take action.

Build your audience.

While those might sound overly generic, don't be quick to dismiss them. If all these really smart and successful people keep saying these episode after episode as their “#1 tip,” I think they’re worth paying attention to.

What action can you take today to apply those tips?

My #1 Tip? Find your WHY.

Why side hustle? What are you trying to build? What will that afford you?

At the end of this episode, I share a new #1-ish tip: if success is owning your calendar and being free to spend your time how you like, start doing it today in some small but meaningful way.

]]>The best advice from my last 49 guests.

At the end of nearly every episode of The Side Hustle Show, I ask my guests for their #1 tip for Side Hustle Nation. There’s always a great variety of responses, and I wanted to take some time today to go through some of my favorites from the past 50-ish interviews.

I first did this for episode 50, which was my first-ever solo podcast recording, and then again in episode 124 and episode 177. If you like this short-and-sweet meta-style show, be sure to check out those ones from the archives as well.

And even though my primary motivation is to extract helpful tactics for you, the listener, I can't help but learn from my guests as well. You never know when inspiration will strike or where you'll hear the one insight that has a huge impact.

These episodes are a lot of fun to put together, and give me an excuse to revisit some of my favorite moments and wise words from the show.

From the last 49 guests, the 3 most common #1 tips I heard were:

Get started.

Take action.

Build your audience.

While those might sound overly generic, don't be quick to dismiss them. If all these really smart and successful people keep saying these episode after episode as their “#1 tip,” I think they’re worth paying attention to.

What action can you take today to apply those tips?

My #1 Tip? Find your WHY.

Why side hustle? What are you trying to build? What will that afford you?

At the end of this episode, I share a new #1-ish tip: if success is owning your calendar and being free to spend your time how you like, start doing it today in some small but meaningful way.

]]>22:53no235: Selling Digital Products to Business or Government Clients: An Online Business Success Story with a TwistThu, 22 Jun 2017 09:00:00 +0000As one of several side hustles, Ryan Dowd runs HomelessLibrary.com, a training program that teaches librarians how to confidently and compassionately deal with their homeless patrons.

It’s something a little different from the business-to-consumer model we usually see with online course sales and comes with some advantages over the B2C market — namely potentially higher prices and the ability to perform direct outreach.

By day Ryan is the executive director for a homeless shelter in Illinois, but on the side he’s also an adjunct professor, a practicing attorney, and he’s writing a book — in addition to the 3-15 hours a week he spends on HomelessLibrary.com.

(And he’s married with a couple kids, so it’s fair to say he’s a busy guy.)

Ryan was working at the homeless shelter when a friend asked if he would speak at a local conference about homelessness to a group of librarian executive directors.

His talk went so well he started receiving offers to deliver training in person at libraries. Not having the time to travel to different locations, Ryan recorded a 30-minute video, posted it on YouTube, and sent people the link.

Now with over 13,000 views, his video has become a staple training tool for librarians across the country and there was a demand for more.

Ryan capitalized on this by recording a longer, more in-depth training. He broke it up into modules and began selling it to libraries across the US.

Tune in to hear how that first conference speaking gig Ryan did for a friend turned into a successful side hustle selling B2B online courses and started what he calls, “A crazy wild ride with a completely accidental start.”

]]>As one of several side hustles, Ryan Dowd runs HomelessLibrary.com, a training program that teaches librarians how to confidently and compassionately deal with their homeless patrons.

It’s something a little different from the business-to-consumer model we usually see with online course sales and comes with some advantages over the B2C market — namely potentially higher prices and the ability to perform direct outreach.

By day Ryan is the executive director for a homeless shelter in Illinois, but on the side he’s also an adjunct professor, a practicing attorney, and he’s writing a book — in addition to the 3-15 hours a week he spends on HomelessLibrary.com.

(And he’s married with a couple kids, so it’s fair to say he’s a busy guy.)

Ryan was working at the homeless shelter when a friend asked if he would speak at a local conference about homelessness to a group of librarian executive directors.

His talk went so well he started receiving offers to deliver training in person at libraries. Not having the time to travel to different locations, Ryan recorded a 30-minute video, posted it on YouTube, and sent people the link.

Now with over 13,000 views, his video has become a staple training tool for librarians across the country and there was a demand for more.

Ryan capitalized on this by recording a longer, more in-depth training. He broke it up into modules and began selling it to libraries across the US.

Tune in to hear how that first conference speaking gig Ryan did for a friend turned into a successful side hustle selling B2B online courses and started what he calls, “A crazy wild ride with a completely accidental start.”

]]>28:35no234: Side Hustle Sales Coaching: What Do I Do and Who Do I Do it For?Thu, 15 Jun 2017 09:00:00 +0000Listen in on a real life side hustle coaching call with customer acquisition and retention strategist David Hutcherson (he's the client), and sales pro Brendan Alan Barrett (he and I share the coaching duties).

We're joined by our "client" David, who's seeking to grow his freelance/consulting side hustle and build on his decade of experience in customer service.

We dive into where David is at in his business today, how he got his first few clients, and where he'd like to go from here.

The good news is he's not starting from scratch. He's had a handful of clients for community management and customer market research gigs, including the world famous improv theater Second City, but nothing recurring and not much in the pipeline at the moment.

We do our best to point him in the right direction and get him to try and figure out what exactly is the service he offers and who he offers it to. And we just might have a breakthrough on that front about 20 minutes in.

Tune in to hear the types of questions you'll have to ask yourself in a service-based side hustle. Put yourself in David's shoes as you listen and think about what you'd do in his position -- and your own.

]]>Listen in on a real life side hustle coaching call with customer acquisition and retention strategist David Hutcherson (he's the client), and sales pro Brendan Alan Barrett (he and I share the coaching duties).

We're joined by our "client" David, who's seeking to grow his freelance/consulting side hustle and build on his decade of experience in customer service.

We dive into where David is at in his business today, how he got his first few clients, and where he'd like to go from here.

The good news is he's not starting from scratch. He's had a handful of clients for community management and customer market research gigs, including the world famous improv theater Second City, but nothing recurring and not much in the pipeline at the moment.

We do our best to point him in the right direction and get him to try and figure out what exactly is the service he offers and who he offers it to. And we just might have a breakthrough on that front about 20 minutes in.

Tune in to hear the types of questions you'll have to ask yourself in a service-based side hustle. Put yourself in David's shoes as you listen and think about what you'd do in his position -- and your own.

]]>34:46no233: How to 10x Your Service Business in Under Two YearsThu, 08 Jun 2017 09:00:00 +0000“People don’t buy intellectually, they buy emotionally,” Jim Brown told me. By taking a unique approach, understanding your demographic, and identifying the pain points you can solve, you can attract clients and increase sales.

Jim is a former professional wrestler, a Marine Corps vet, a sales coach, and is the founder and host of the SalesTuners podcast at SalesTuners.com.

In this year’s survey results, a lot of Side Hustle Nation readers said they needed help growing their business and attracting new customers. This is exactly what Jim does with his clients, and he shares his tactics and processes in this episode.

As entrepreneurs and side hustlers, we are all the VP of sales for our own businesses. The only person driving a company forward in the early stages is the founder, and nothing happens until someone sells something to someone else.

Tune in to hear how you can 10x your service business by setting a revenue goal, breaking down the numbers and planning out a step-by-step approach, and making outreach calls the way Jim does with his clients.

Jim is a former professional wrestler, a Marine Corps vet, a sales coach, and is the founder and host of the SalesTuners podcast at SalesTuners.com.

In this year’s survey results, a lot of Side Hustle Nation readers said they needed help growing their business and attracting new customers. This is exactly what Jim does with his clients, and he shares his tactics and processes in this episode.

As entrepreneurs and side hustlers, we are all the VP of sales for our own businesses. The only person driving a company forward in the early stages is the founder, and nothing happens until someone sells something to someone else.

Tune in to hear how you can 10x your service business by setting a revenue goal, breaking down the numbers and planning out a step-by-step approach, and making outreach calls the way Jim does with his clients.

]]>41:55no232: Going Big on Medium: How a New Blogger Got His First 6000 Email Subscribers (and Made $10k) in 6 MonthsThu, 01 Jun 2017 09:00:00 +0000Ben Foley started writing about how to use mindfulness to reduce stress and anxiety at FullyRichLife.com a little over 6 months ago.

Since then, his little side project has generated over 6000 email subscribers and $10,000 in revenue.

Having overcome stress and anxiety issues himself, he knew this was a niche he could enter and help others. And, with a different approach to using mindfulness in the modern world to help reduce stress working for him, he knew he had a unique angle to blog about.

Before starting his site in December last year Ben had never even written a blog post. However, after finding a passion for writing and encouraged by positive feedback, he “tripled down” on content and started getting huge exposure almost right away -- something new sites often struggle with.

Having overcome stress and anxiety issues himself, he knew this was a niche he could enter and help others. And, with a different approach to using mindfulness in the modern world to help reduce stress working for him, he knew he had a unique angle to blog about.

Before starting his site in December last year Ben had never even written a blog post. However, after finding a passion for writing and encouraged by positive feedback, he “tripled down” on content and started getting huge exposure almost right away -- something new sites often struggle with.

Tune in to hear how you can use Medium to growth hack your new or existing site, and how Ben is turning those readers into subscribers and revenue.

]]>33:51no231: Affiliate Marketing the Authority Hacker Way: Build a Profitable Website from ScratchThu, 25 May 2017 09:00:00 +0000Perrin Carrell is a senior contributing editor at AuthorityHacker and well-known within the internet marketing community for building niche/authority sites.

He has built several successful sites from scratch, including one recent project that went from a valuation of $0 to $200,000 in just under 20 months.

Perrin started learning about internet marketing and SEO while working a day job at a global communications consulting firm. Desperate to escape the day job and turn his side hustle into a full-time business he started building sites and learning from his failures along the way.

He now has the blueprint nailed for building profitable sites with several different income streams.

From planning the site structure, ordering content, carrying out keyword research, to link-building, Perrin shares exactly how he builds his sites in this episode.

]]>Perrin Carrell is a senior contributing editor at AuthorityHacker and well-known within the internet marketing community for building niche/authority sites.

He has built several successful sites from scratch, including one recent project that went from a valuation of $0 to $200,000 in just under 20 months.

Perrin started learning about internet marketing and SEO while working a day job at a global communications consulting firm. Desperate to escape the day job and turn his side hustle into a full-time business he started building sites and learning from his failures along the way.

He now has the blueprint nailed for building profitable sites with several different income streams.

From planning the site structure, ordering content, carrying out keyword research, to link-building, Perrin shares exactly how he builds his sites in this episode.

]]>43:08no230: How 25 Side Hustlers Made Their First Entrepreneurial IncomeThu, 18 May 2017 09:00:00 +0000What's the story of your first job-free income?

To celebrate the 4-year anniversary of The Side Hustle Show, the Side Hustle Nation community joined me in creating a really fun episode.

I asked people to tell me how they first started making money on the side, and got 25 different voicemails!

In this episode, you'll hear first-hand the steps your fellow listeners took to put themselves back in the driver seat of their own financial well-being. And no matter how you shake it, that first sale is a powerful one.

]]>What's the story of your first job-free income?

To celebrate the 4-year anniversary of The Side Hustle Show, the Side Hustle Nation community joined me in creating a really fun episode.

I asked people to tell me how they first started making money on the side, and got 25 different voicemails!

In this episode, you'll hear first-hand the steps your fellow listeners took to put themselves back in the driver seat of their own financial well-being. And no matter how you shake it, that first sale is a powerful one.

]]>49:45no229: How a Part-Time Podcast Turned into Multiple Streams of IncomeThu, 11 May 2017 09:00:00 +0000Steve P. Young is a side hustler turned full-time entrepreneur. He has hosted more than 500 episodes of the AppMasters podcast, a podcast dedicated to helping app makers get more downloads and sales of their apps.

Steve was working full-time when he decided to start his podcast interviewing app developers and putting out content for the app community.

Using lunch breaks, early morning, and late nights, Steve found the time to put out two episodes a week and start building up authority and an audience in the app space.

Within four months he had his first consulting client, and within seven months he was handing in his notice at his day job as AppMasters became his full-time business.

Tune in to find out how Steve built up several income streams around his podcast:

The apps (how it all started)

Consulting

Podcast sponsorship

Digital products and courses

A private mastermind group

A live in-person event

You'll hear the hacks he used to grow his audience in a short time period, and how interviewing influential people in the app space helped double sales on his own apps.

]]>Steve P. Young is a side hustler turned full-time entrepreneur. He has hosted more than 500 episodes of the AppMasters podcast, a podcast dedicated to helping app makers get more downloads and sales of their apps.

Steve was working full-time when he decided to start his podcast interviewing app developers and putting out content for the app community.

Using lunch breaks, early morning, and late nights, Steve found the time to put out two episodes a week and start building up authority and an audience in the app space.

Within four months he had his first consulting client, and within seven months he was handing in his notice at his day job as AppMasters became his full-time business.

Tune in to find out how Steve built up several income streams around his podcast:

The apps (how it all started)

Consulting

Podcast sponsorship

Digital products and courses

A private mastermind group

A live in-person event

You'll hear the hacks he used to grow his audience in a short time period, and how interviewing influential people in the app space helped double sales on his own apps.

]]>42:27no228: Facebook Ads 101 for Freelancers and BloggersThu, 04 May 2017 09:00:00 +0000Kamila Gornia is the “Blow Up, Scale Up” Marketing Strategist who helps entrepreneurs blow up and scale up their businesses to become true leaders online.

And often that means helping them reach a broader audience on Facebook.

If you’re a freelancer or blogger, Facebook Ads could be a way to grow your business faster. With the social network closing in on 2 billion active users, no matter what you're selling or where you're selling it, odds are your target customer is on Facebook.

Whether you’re new to Facebook and setting up a business page from scratch, or you’ve run ads before, Kamila shares tips and advice to help you turn your ad campaigns into a positive ROI.

]]>Kamila Gornia is the “Blow Up, Scale Up” Marketing Strategist who helps entrepreneurs blow up and scale up their businesses to become true leaders online.

And often that means helping them reach a broader audience on Facebook.

If you’re a freelancer or blogger, Facebook Ads could be a way to grow your business faster. With the social network closing in on 2 billion active users, no matter what you're selling or where you're selling it, odds are your target customer is on Facebook.

Whether you’re new to Facebook and setting up a business page from scratch, or you’ve run ads before, Kamila shares tips and advice to help you turn your ad campaigns into a positive ROI.

]]>37:06no227: How a Professional Card Counter Beat the Odds in Online BusinessThu, 27 Apr 2017 09:00:00 +0000Don't you just love a good outsmarting the casino story? Bring me an Ocean’s Eleven, bring me a Bringing Down the House -- I’m all about it.

Colin Jones is a professional card counter whose blackjack teams won almost $4 million, and he earned over $500k himself.

Now a father of 6, Colin's playing days are mostly over, but he's turned his unique skill into a profitable online business at BlackjackApprenticeship.com.

When we met at a Side Hustle Nation meetup in Seattle over the holidays, Colin explained that card counting -- though glamorized by Hollywood -- is "a hard way to make easy money." He also pointed out that the math involved is elementary-school level, and done right, it really can be seen as an investment and not a gamble.

Today, his Blackjack Apprenticeship site has more than 500 members and in this episode, you'll hear how he's grown this business, how he's priced his different offerings, and how he keeps customers sticking around for more.

]]>Don't you just love a good outsmarting the casino story? Bring me an Ocean’s Eleven, bring me a Bringing Down the House -- I’m all about it.

Colin Jones is a professional card counter whose blackjack teams won almost $4 million, and he earned over $500k himself.

Now a father of 6, Colin's playing days are mostly over, but he's turned his unique skill into a profitable online business at BlackjackApprenticeship.com.

When we met at a Side Hustle Nation meetup in Seattle over the holidays, Colin explained that card counting -- though glamorized by Hollywood -- is "a hard way to make easy money." He also pointed out that the math involved is elementary-school level, and done right, it really can be seen as an investment and not a gamble.

Today, his Blackjack Apprenticeship site has more than 500 members and in this episode, you'll hear how he's grown this business, how he's priced his different offerings, and how he keeps customers sticking around for more.

]]>37:19no226: Earn Your First $500 on the Side in the Next 7 Days - No More Excuses!Thu, 20 Apr 2017 09:00:00 +0000Scott Voelker is the host of the super popular Amazing Seller podcast, where he’s recorded more than 300 episodes about the Amazon FBA business model.

He's a family man and a serial hustler, having been involved with a number of businesses ranging from construction to photography to ecommerce.

His latest project is the 1k FastTrack Challenge, where he takes a group of students through the paces of making their first $1000 selling online.

One of the biggest challenges people struggle to overcome is deciding on, or even finding a side hustle they can start and take those important first steps.

In this episode of The Side Hustle Show, Scott takes you through the 5-steps he uses when guiding his students to earning their first $500 online in just 7 days.

He also shares some powerful words of motivation and some success stories he’s been part of, helping you to see just how easy it really is when you follow these 5 simple steps.

"You’re probably sitting on a few hundred, if not thousands of dollars in your possession right now that you’re not even aware of," Scott explained.

Tune in to find out exactly what Scott is talking about, and how you can start your own challenge today to earn $500 in the next 7 days. No investment needed, no prior experience selling online, just the motivation and willingness to stick to a deadline.

One of the biggest challenges people struggle to overcome is deciding on, or even finding a side hustle they can start and take those important first steps.

In this episode of The Side Hustle Show, Scott takes you through the 5-steps he uses when guiding his students to earning their first $500 online in just 7 days.

He also shares some powerful words of motivation and some success stories he’s been part of, helping you to see just how easy it really is when you follow these 5 simple steps.

"You’re probably sitting on a few hundred, if not thousands of dollars in your possession right now that you’re not even aware of," Scott explained.

Tune in to find out exactly what Scott is talking about, and how you can start your own challenge today to earn $500 in the next 7 days. No investment needed, no prior experience selling online, just the motivation and willingness to stick to a deadline.

Dr. Meadows explains why turnkey rental properties are a becoming a popular investment vehicle right now, and a couple platforms and markets to consider. He shares how he evaluates the numbers on each deal (he now owns 7 turnkey properties) and what search criteria he uses.

(Am I the only one who can't read "turnkey" with thinking "turkey"??)

He also explains why real estate private lending is perhaps less risky than peer-to-peer lending, the sites he uses to find opportunities, and how you can get a 10-14% return on 6-18 month loans.

Business lending has also been a profitable alternative investment for Dr. Meadows, netting him an average yield of 14.5% over the last 2 years on one platform. He shares the sites he uses to find investment opportunities along with tips to help you find lower risk investment opportunities.

]]>Dr. Kenyon Meadows MD is a practicing Radiation Oncologist by day, but by nights and weekends he’s a self-proclaimed alternative investment enthusiast.

Dr. Meadows explains why turnkey rental properties are a becoming a popular investment vehicle right now, and a couple platforms and markets to consider. He shares how he evaluates the numbers on each deal (he now owns 7 turnkey properties) and what search criteria he uses.

(Am I the only one who can't read "turnkey" with thinking "turkey"??)

He also explains why real estate private lending is perhaps less risky than peer-to-peer lending, the sites he uses to find opportunities, and how you can get a 10-14% return on 6-18 month loans.

Business lending has also been a profitable alternative investment for Dr. Meadows, netting him an average yield of 14.5% over the last 2 years on one platform. He shares the sites he uses to find investment opportunities along with tips to help you find lower risk investment opportunities.

]]>44:04no224: $5k a Month as a Self-Published Author - in FictionThu, 06 Apr 2017 09:00:00 +0000Derek Murphy's book portfolio is bringing in $5k a month. He's is a world traveler, book cover design extraordinaire, and the author of a dozen different books, mainly in the young adult fantasy genre.

A lot of the self-publishing content and interviews on the Side Hustle Show has been related to non-fiction books, and to me, it's a more straightforward process: help someone solve a problem.

Fiction is a bit of a different animal, and something Derek covers in detail over on his site at CreativIndie.com.

Derek started out editing books and designing book covers while completing his Masters and PhD in literature. Having an interest in reading fiction and wanting to get away from client work, Derek started writing fiction books.

He explained there's a lot more demand for fiction than non-fiction, and because of that it can be easier to make more money.

It’s not as competitive as you may think either. Although there are literally millions of fiction books available, when you cut through to the books that are being marketed and targeted to the right audience, Derek says it’s not that difficult.

Tune in to hear how Derek starts by finding keywords and researching what the readers want based on what's already selling, then testing the market for demand before committing to a series of books.

He also shares the methods he used to grow an email list of more than 32,000 as well as advice on how to launch a book with an email list of zero.

]]>Derek Murphy's book portfolio is bringing in $5k a month. He's is a world traveler, book cover design extraordinaire, and the author of a dozen different books, mainly in the young adult fantasy genre.

A lot of the self-publishing content and interviews on the Side Hustle Show has been related to non-fiction books, and to me, it's a more straightforward process: help someone solve a problem.

Fiction is a bit of a different animal, and something Derek covers in detail over on his site at CreativIndie.com.

Derek started out editing books and designing book covers while completing his Masters and PhD in literature. Having an interest in reading fiction and wanting to get away from client work, Derek started writing fiction books.

He explained there's a lot more demand for fiction than non-fiction, and because of that it can be easier to make more money.

It’s not as competitive as you may think either. Although there are literally millions of fiction books available, when you cut through to the books that are being marketed and targeted to the right audience, Derek says it’s not that difficult.

Tune in to hear how Derek starts by finding keywords and researching what the readers want based on what's already selling, then testing the market for demand before committing to a series of books.

He also shares the methods he used to grow an email list of more than 32,000 as well as advice on how to launch a book with an email list of zero.

]]>38:43no223: How to Turn Your Hobby into an Online BusinessThu, 30 Mar 2017 09:00:00 +0000Jacques Hopkins is a former full-time engineer who turned his passion for playing piano from a side hustle into a full-time business at the end of 2015.

With more time and energy to devote to Pianoin21Days.com, the business continued to reach new heights.

It was after reading the entrepreneurial handbook that’s inspired a generation to start side hustles – The 4-Hour Workweek, by Tim Ferriss – that Jacques knew he wanted to start "something on the side that could make money."

That was back in 2007, and after several failed ventures, each of which has played a part in getting him to where he is now, Jacques is crushing it with his YouTube videos, ebook sales, and online course.

Tune in to hear how Jacques realized there was a market for teaching “regular people learn to play modern songs on the piano in as little time as possible.”

You'll hear how he used YouTube to generate lots of free traffic and build his email list, how he doubled his conversions by picking up the phone and talking to potential customers, and how he now lives the lifestyle wants and spends his time promoting the business.

]]>Jacques Hopkins is a former full-time engineer who turned his passion for playing piano from a side hustle into a full-time business at the end of 2015.

With more time and energy to devote to Pianoin21Days.com, the business continued to reach new heights.

It was after reading the entrepreneurial handbook that’s inspired a generation to start side hustles – The 4-Hour Workweek, by Tim Ferriss – that Jacques knew he wanted to start "something on the side that could make money."

That was back in 2007, and after several failed ventures, each of which has played a part in getting him to where he is now, Jacques is crushing it with his YouTube videos, ebook sales, and online course.

Tune in to hear how Jacques realized there was a market for teaching “regular people learn to play modern songs on the piano in as little time as possible.”

You'll hear how he used YouTube to generate lots of free traffic and build his email list, how he doubled his conversions by picking up the phone and talking to potential customers, and how he now lives the lifestyle wants and spends his time promoting the business.

]]>34:30no222: 5 Real Estate Side Hustles You Can Start on the CheapThu, 23 Mar 2017 09:00:00 +0000Chad Carson is a 30-something semi-retired real estate mogul, who together with his business partner, oversees a portfolio of 90+ rental units.

In fact, he and his wife are in the middle of an exciting adventure — a year abroad in Ecuador with their two daughters.

But of course he didn’t start there. Fresh off the football field at Clemson, Chad’s real estate career started more modestly by “bird dogging” and house hacking — two of the tactics he shares in this week’s show.

You can learn more about Chad and his real estate business at CoachCarson.com, where he writes about using real estate investing to retire early and do what matters.

In this episode, Chad walks me through 5 real estate side hustles you can start on the cheap. Tune in to hear:

How to use house hacking to earn rental income and live for free

How to take advantage of tax-free live-in flips

How anyone can start master leasing

How to become a leasing agent

How to start “Bird-dogging”

Chad proves that you that you don’t need a large down payment to get started in real estate. You can even learn “how to do one of the more important parts of the rental business on someone else’s dime” if you’re smart about it.

This episode is packed with actionable advice to help get you started with a side hustle in the real estate market, as well as some long-term options to set you on the path to building long-term wealth.

]]>Chad Carson is a 30-something semi-retired real estate mogul, who together with his business partner, oversees a portfolio of 90+ rental units.

In fact, he and his wife are in the middle of an exciting adventure — a year abroad in Ecuador with their two daughters.

But of course he didn’t start there. Fresh off the football field at Clemson, Chad’s real estate career started more modestly by “bird dogging” and house hacking — two of the tactics he shares in this week’s show.

You can learn more about Chad and his real estate business at CoachCarson.com, where he writes about using real estate investing to retire early and do what matters.

In this episode, Chad walks me through 5 real estate side hustles you can start on the cheap. Tune in to hear:

How to use house hacking to earn rental income and live for free

How to take advantage of tax-free live-in flips

How anyone can start master leasing

How to become a leasing agent

How to start “Bird-dogging”

Chad proves that you that you don’t need a large down payment to get started in real estate. You can even learn “how to do one of the more important parts of the rental business on someone else’s dime” if you’re smart about it.

This episode is packed with actionable advice to help get you started with a side hustle in the real estate market, as well as some long-term options to set you on the path to building long-term wealth.

]]>41:55no221: Wholesale on Amazon: From Part-Time Hobby to $13 Million in Amazon FBA SalesThu, 16 Mar 2017 09:00:00 +0000Dan Meadors is one-half of TheWholesaleFormula.com. He and his partner Eric Lambert began selling on Amazon as a hobby with an original investment of only $600.

It took only a few months before they saw the potential to turn this hobby into a business and they both left their day jobs to sell on Amazon full-time. Since then they have been able to generate over $13,000,000 in total sales on Amazon.

In Dan's case, he's buying inventory at wholesale prices from a brand or manufacturer, instead of trolling the clearance section at Walmart or having a product built specifically for him by a manufacturer. Then, like the other Amazon FBA business models, it's on him to list and sell it through Amazon.

In this episode, Dan talks me through everything you need to know to get started with wholesaling on Amazon, including how to target potential products and brands to sell, and how to reach out to them in a helpful way.

]]>Dan Meadors is one-half of TheWholesaleFormula.com. He and his partner Eric Lambert began selling on Amazon as a hobby with an original investment of only $600.

It took only a few months before they saw the potential to turn this hobby into a business and they both left their day jobs to sell on Amazon full-time. Since then they have been able to generate over $13,000,000 in total sales on Amazon.

In Dan's case, he's buying inventory at wholesale prices from a brand or manufacturer, instead of trolling the clearance section at Walmart or having a product built specifically for him by a manufacturer. Then, like the other Amazon FBA business models, it's on him to list and sell it through Amazon.

In this episode, Dan talks me through everything you need to know to get started with wholesaling on Amazon, including how to target potential products and brands to sell, and how to reach out to them in a helpful way.

]]>26:34no220: SEO for Bloggers: How to Get More Free Traffic to Your WebsiteThu, 09 Mar 2017 10:00:00 +0000Joseph Hogue is a Marine Corps veteran, a former investment analyst, an author, a blogger, a freelancer, and an all-around super smart dude.

We met through FinCon and hit it off right away. Maybe because we have the same haircut??

Joseph runs a number of blogs, and through smart keyword research, great content, and some techniques he uses to attract lots of high authority backlinks, Joseph has seen his traffic, and more importantly his revenue increase quickly in the last two years.

Search engine optimization (SEO) doesn’t need to be difficult, time-consuming, or expensive. Joseph uses a simple process to find keywords with “buyer intent”, optimizes his content with on-page SEO, and uses some innovative, but simple techniques to generate powerful backlinks that Google will love and in turn boost your posts in the search results.

Tune in to hear Joseph’s SEO tips, techniques, and hacks. He shares examples of his own link building techniques, loads of useful tools to help you gain that competitive advantage over others in your niche, and ultimately ways you can increase your blog revenue.

]]>Joseph Hogue is a Marine Corps veteran, a former investment analyst, an author, a blogger, a freelancer, and an all-around super smart dude.

We met through FinCon and hit it off right away. Maybe because we have the same haircut??

Joseph runs a number of blogs, and through smart keyword research, great content, and some techniques he uses to attract lots of high authority backlinks, Joseph has seen his traffic, and more importantly his revenue increase quickly in the last two years.

Search engine optimization (SEO) doesn’t need to be difficult, time-consuming, or expensive. Joseph uses a simple process to find keywords with “buyer intent”, optimizes his content with on-page SEO, and uses some innovative, but simple techniques to generate powerful backlinks that Google will love and in turn boost your posts in the search results.

Tune in to hear Joseph’s SEO tips, techniques, and hacks. He shares examples of his own link building techniques, loads of useful tools to help you gain that competitive advantage over others in your niche, and ultimately ways you can increase your blog revenue.

]]>49:06no219: Growing Traffic, Monetization, List-Building, a Day in the Life, and More: 20 Questions with NickThu, 02 Mar 2017 10:00:00 +0000It’s time to dive into the ol’ listener mailbag and answer a few questions in this week's edition of The Side Hustle Show.

It's been a few months since the last Q&A show I did and I’ve had quite a few interesting questions come in since then. I picked 20 to talk through in today's show.

A common piece of advice you'll hear is to take audience questions and turn them into content, so here's a meta example of that in action.

]]>36:55no218: How to Build a 6-Figure Side Hustle on FiverrThu, 23 Feb 2017 10:00:00 +0000Kendell Rizzo made over $100,000 in profit in 18 months part-time selling services, workbooks, and other downloadable products on Fiverr.

In addition to being a 6-figure Fiverr seller, Kendell is a crowdfunding expert, a world traveler, an ironman triathlete, and runs her blog at leadandlaunch.com.

It’s been more than 100 episodes since our last Fiverr episode where Mark (AnarchoFighter) talked me through how he was the first person to make a $10k sale on Fiverr.

Fiverr is still going strong, and it’s a great example of a Buy Buttons platform – there's no bidding for work and no outside marketing necessary. This is what attracted Kendell to Fiverr after being frustrated with other freelance endeavors that sap time bidding for jobs or submitting resumes.

Within a year and a half Kendell turned over more than $100k in profit, and went from the $5 gigs everyone starts out with to averaging between $500-$900 an order. And with digital products for sale, this was all possible while working part-time.

Tune in to hear how she made her gigs stand out from the crowd in the competitive Fiverr marketplace, and why “over-delivering” is a fast-track to Fiverr success.

]]>Kendell Rizzo made over $100,000 in profit in 18 months part-time selling services, workbooks, and other downloadable products on Fiverr.

In addition to being a 6-figure Fiverr seller, Kendell is a crowdfunding expert, a world traveler, an ironman triathlete, and runs her blog at leadandlaunch.com.

It’s been more than 100 episodes since our last Fiverr episode where Mark (AnarchoFighter) talked me through how he was the first person to make a $10k sale on Fiverr.

Fiverr is still going strong, and it’s a great example of a Buy Buttons platform – there's no bidding for work and no outside marketing necessary. This is what attracted Kendell to Fiverr after being frustrated with other freelance endeavors that sap time bidding for jobs or submitting resumes.

Within a year and a half Kendell turned over more than $100k in profit, and went from the $5 gigs everyone starts out with to averaging between $500-$900 an order. And with digital products for sale, this was all possible while working part-time.

Tune in to hear how she made her gigs stand out from the crowd in the competitive Fiverr marketplace, and why “over-delivering” is a fast-track to Fiverr success.

]]>31:32no217: Crowdfunding 101: How to Raise Money for Your Next ProjectThu, 16 Feb 2017 10:00:00 +0000Nathan Chan is the founder of FoundrMag.com. The digital magazine started as a side hustle in 2013, and has since transformed into a multi-million dollar media company.

Nathan is perhaps best-known for growing his business through Instagram, a platform where Foundr now has almost a million followers.

But today I want to dive into a different angle of Nathan’s business, and that’s crowdfunding.

Time, money, and ideas are the big 3 challenges I hear from Side Hustle Nation over and over again, and this conversation attempts to address one possible answer to the money question.

Nathan and his team are fresh off a $200,000 Kickstarter campaign for the first volume of Foundr books, a really high-end, beautifully designed coffee table book, which you can find at foundrmag.com/book.

In this episode, Nathan shares why Kickstarter is such a powerful platform -- even if you don’t have a big built-in audience, and everything he did to make their campaign a hit. Stay tuned for his advice on why you might consider crowdfunding, how to make the most of your Kickstarter exposure, and some examples of other side hustler’s products that have taken off.

]]>Nathan Chan is the founder of FoundrMag.com. The digital magazine started as a side hustle in 2013, and has since transformed into a multi-million dollar media company.

Nathan is perhaps best-known for growing his business through Instagram, a platform where Foundr now has almost a million followers.

But today I want to dive into a different angle of Nathan’s business, and that’s crowdfunding.

Time, money, and ideas are the big 3 challenges I hear from Side Hustle Nation over and over again, and this conversation attempts to address one possible answer to the money question.

Nathan and his team are fresh off a $200,000 Kickstarter campaign for the first volume of Foundr books, a really high-end, beautifully designed coffee table book, which you can find at foundrmag.com/book.

In this episode, Nathan shares why Kickstarter is such a powerful platform -- even if you don’t have a big built-in audience, and everything he did to make their campaign a hit. Stay tuned for his advice on why you might consider crowdfunding, how to make the most of your Kickstarter exposure, and some examples of other side hustler’s products that have taken off.

]]>31:32no216: Merch by Amazon: $53k in T-Shirt Profits in 10 Hours a WeekThu, 09 Feb 2017 10:00:00 +0000I’m excited to introduce you to a new Buy Buttons opportunity under the Amazon ecommerce umbrella called Merch by Amazon: it’s a print-on-demand service for t-shirts now (and perhaps other merchandise in the future).

My wife and I have already made our first sales on this platform and it's become our latest side hustle obsession.

To help me explore this business model, I invited Elaine Heney on the program. She’s an app entrepreneur, a former Amazon FBA seller (a biz she actually sold), and last year she sold over $128,000 worth of t-shirts through Merch by Amazon program, of which $53k was profit. You can follow along with Elaine's Merch adventures at MerchEntrepreneur.com.

The advantage Amazon has over other print-on-demand sites is their massive daily organic traffic. Elaine doesn’t even need to do any marketing to promote her shirts, and using their interface is as easy as uploading a design, choosing colors, and clicking a button to list your shirts.

There are no monthly fees, and no inventory risk.

In this episode, Elaine takes you through the steps you need to take to start an account on the Merch by Amazon program. She shares how she finds graphic designers to help with her t-shirt designs, how to use the Merch by Amazon platform, and some of her best tips for creating designs that will sell well.

]]>I’m excited to introduce you to a new Buy Buttons opportunity under the Amazon ecommerce umbrella called Merch by Amazon: it’s a print-on-demand service for t-shirts now (and perhaps other merchandise in the future).

My wife and I have already made our first sales on this platform and it's become our latest side hustle obsession.

To help me explore this business model, I invited Elaine Heney on the program. She’s an app entrepreneur, a former Amazon FBA seller (a biz she actually sold), and last year she sold over $128,000 worth of t-shirts through Merch by Amazon program, of which $53k was profit. You can follow along with Elaine's Merch adventures at MerchEntrepreneur.com.

The advantage Amazon has over other print-on-demand sites is their massive daily organic traffic. Elaine doesn’t even need to do any marketing to promote her shirts, and using their interface is as easy as uploading a design, choosing colors, and clicking a button to list your shirts.

There are no monthly fees, and no inventory risk.

In this episode, Elaine takes you through the steps you need to take to start an account on the Merch by Amazon program. She shares how she finds graphic designers to help with her t-shirt designs, how to use the Merch by Amazon platform, and some of her best tips for creating designs that will sell well.

]]>33:27no215: How to Quickly Build an Online Business When You Don't Have an AudienceThu, 02 Feb 2017 10:00:00 +0000Mark Wills is a professional notary public loan signing agent. It's something he started doing as a side hustle that eventually turned into a full-time business.

While his friend Roman Rosario was between startups, Mark showed him how to do loan signings to make extra money.

Loan signing agents are the people who walk you through the final paperwork when you are buying or refinancing a home. The signing agent is required to make sure you understand all the paperwork, answer any questions you have, and sign off the documents.

These appointments take around 1-2 hours and the signing agent can earn anywhere between $75 and $200.

Mark's system worked and Roman had his first signing -- and his first payday -- right away.

And that sparked an entirely new business idea. If Mark could teach him how to do this in just a few hours, he could probably teach others online as well.

Although Mark had no online or social media presence or audience to speak of, he and Roman set out to validate, create, and sell an online course teaching other people to do what he does. That became LoanSigningSystem.com.

Fast forward a year and the guys are making $4k a month selling their course. In this episode they talk you through the steps they took to validate their idea, how they built their course using content from free webinars, their marketing techniques, email responder series, and more.

]]>Mark Wills is a professional notary public loan signing agent. It's something he started doing as a side hustle that eventually turned into a full-time business.

While his friend Roman Rosario was between startups, Mark showed him how to do loan signings to make extra money.

Loan signing agents are the people who walk you through the final paperwork when you are buying or refinancing a home. The signing agent is required to make sure you understand all the paperwork, answer any questions you have, and sign off the documents.

These appointments take around 1-2 hours and the signing agent can earn anywhere between $75 and $200.

Mark's system worked and Roman had his first signing -- and his first payday -- right away.

And that sparked an entirely new business idea. If Mark could teach him how to do this in just a few hours, he could probably teach others online as well.

Although Mark had no online or social media presence or audience to speak of, he and Roman set out to validate, create, and sell an online course teaching other people to do what he does. That became LoanSigningSystem.com.

Fast forward a year and the guys are making $4k a month selling their course. In this episode they talk you through the steps they took to validate their idea, how they built their course using content from free webinars, their marketing techniques, email responder series, and more.

]]>38:06no214: Become a Master of Productivity, Discipline, and FocusThu, 26 Jan 2017 10:00:00 +0000John Lee Dumas is the undisputed king of productivity, discipline, and focus--the guy is a machine!

John is the host of EOFire, where he interviews today’s most successful entrepreneurs 7-days a week.

JLD has grown EOFire into a multi-million dollar a year business with over 1,500 interviews and 1.5 million monthly listens. His latest project is The Mastery Journal: Master productivity, discipline, and focus in 100 days. You can learn more at TheMasteryJournal.com.

Longtime listeners may remember hearing John way back on episode 15 of The Side Hustle Show. Three and a half years and 199 episodes later, I’m excited and honored to have him back on the show.

In this episode, John takes you through some of his top productivity, discipline, and focus tips that anyone can incorporate into their day, business, and lifestyle. He explains why planning your day helps you avoid OPA (Other People’s Agenda) and keeps you on a productive and focused path.

These are the things I struggle with at times--especially focus--and things I constantly hear as challenges from Side Hustle Nation. In fact, I’ve asked thousands of subscribers “what’s holding you back?”, and the lack of time and focus are among the most popular responses.

John has developed The Mastery Journal based on his own success building his 7-figure business, and in this episode he shares some of his top tips and gives an insight into the habits and routines that got him where he is today.

]]>John Lee Dumas is the undisputed king of productivity, discipline, and focus--the guy is a machine!

John is the host of EOFire, where he interviews today’s most successful entrepreneurs 7-days a week.

JLD has grown EOFire into a multi-million dollar a year business with over 1,500 interviews and 1.5 million monthly listens. His latest project is The Mastery Journal: Master productivity, discipline, and focus in 100 days. You can learn more at TheMasteryJournal.com.

Longtime listeners may remember hearing John way back on episode 15 of The Side Hustle Show. Three and a half years and 199 episodes later, I’m excited and honored to have him back on the show.

In this episode, John takes you through some of his top productivity, discipline, and focus tips that anyone can incorporate into their day, business, and lifestyle. He explains why planning your day helps you avoid OPA (Other People’s Agenda) and keeps you on a productive and focused path.

These are the things I struggle with at times--especially focus--and things I constantly hear as challenges from Side Hustle Nation. In fact, I’ve asked thousands of subscribers “what’s holding you back?”, and the lack of time and focus are among the most popular responses.

John has developed The Mastery Journal based on his own success building his 7-figure business, and in this episode he shares some of his top tips and gives an insight into the habits and routines that got him where he is today.

]]>35:38no213: How to Avoid Conflict of Interest Between Your Side Hustle and Your Day JobFri, 20 Jan 2017 10:00:00 +0000Possessing creative powers beyond those of mere mortals, Don "The Idea Guy" is back to help talk through a common but tricky situation side hustlers run into.

This week I invited Don back to help wrestle with the dreaded "conflict of interest" that might arise between your day job and your side hustle.

Inspired by an email from someone in the Side Hustle Nation Community, Don offers some suggestions on how to deal with this at your place of work. He covers how you can test ideas in your day job within a lower risk environment, and perhaps even leverage a raise from your boss based on the results.

Tune in to hear what options you have if your side hustle overlaps a little too closely with your day job.

It's a little bit of a different style of episode, so I'm curious to hear what you think? Would you like to hear more of this "talk show" style show? Or should I stick with the regular interview format?

]]>Possessing creative powers beyond those of mere mortals, Don "The Idea Guy" is back to help talk through a common but tricky situation side hustlers run into.

This week I invited Don back to help wrestle with the dreaded "conflict of interest" that might arise between your day job and your side hustle.

Inspired by an email from someone in the Side Hustle Nation Community, Don offers some suggestions on how to deal with this at your place of work. He covers how you can test ideas in your day job within a lower risk environment, and perhaps even leverage a raise from your boss based on the results.

Tune in to hear what options you have if your side hustle overlaps a little too closely with your day job.

It's a little bit of a different style of episode, so I'm curious to hear what you think? Would you like to hear more of this "talk show" style show? Or should I stick with the regular interview format?

]]>23:54no212: Micro Habits: The Too-Small-to-Fail Plan for Big ResultsThu, 19 Jan 2017 10:00:00 +0000"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit."

That line from Aristotle may be one of the most overused quotes in history.

But it's overused for good reason; it's a good quote. At least the first part. Aristotle was onto something for sure: we are what we repeatedly do.

I agree with that 100%.

The issue I have is with the second part: Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

There’s no such habit called excellence; you can’t wake up tomorrow and start your morning routine with a quick session of excellence before you go grab breakfast.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately about setting new year’s resolutions or goals for the year, which I think is only natural when the calendar flips, but I’m had a hard time coming up with a SMART goal or set of SMART goals for the year I was really excited about.

It’s easy to pick a number out of the sky, like I want to make $1 million, or I want to reach 100,000 subscribers, or I want to become a #1 New York Times Bestseller, and those kinds of goals are great -- if they motivate you and you can reverse engineer a path to get there.

But on the flipside of Big Hairy Audacious Goals like these, to borrow a phrase from Jim Collins, is the micro habit. And that brings us back to Aristotle: we are what we repeatedly do.

I’ve seen the power of consistent execution first-hand; this podcast is probably my best most recent example of that. It started out as an experiment, it cost less than $100, and over the last 3.5 years, I’m not exaggerating when I say it’s been life-changing.

So if you’ve found yourself in kind of the same boat, with everyone around you sharing their resolutions and their ambitious goals for the year and not quite knowing what you should be aiming for yourself, I invite you to consider the micro habit as an alternative.

]]>"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit."

That line from Aristotle may be one of the most overused quotes in history.

But it's overused for good reason; it's a good quote. At least the first part. Aristotle was onto something for sure: we are what we repeatedly do.

I agree with that 100%.

The issue I have is with the second part: Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

There’s no such habit called excellence; you can’t wake up tomorrow and start your morning routine with a quick session of excellence before you go grab breakfast.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately about setting new year’s resolutions or goals for the year, which I think is only natural when the calendar flips, but I’m had a hard time coming up with a SMART goal or set of SMART goals for the year I was really excited about.

It’s easy to pick a number out of the sky, like I want to make $1 million, or I want to reach 100,000 subscribers, or I want to become a #1 New York Times Bestseller, and those kinds of goals are great -- if they motivate you and you can reverse engineer a path to get there.

But on the flipside of Big Hairy Audacious Goals like these, to borrow a phrase from Jim Collins, is the micro habit. And that brings us back to Aristotle: we are what we repeatedly do.

I’ve seen the power of consistent execution first-hand; this podcast is probably my best most recent example of that. It started out as an experiment, it cost less than $100, and over the last 3.5 years, I’m not exaggerating when I say it’s been life-changing.

So if you’ve found yourself in kind of the same boat, with everyone around you sharing their resolutions and their ambitious goals for the year and not quite knowing what you should be aiming for yourself, I invite you to consider the micro habit as an alternative.

]]>11:28no211: Double Your Energy in 7 DaysThu, 12 Jan 2017 10:00:00 +0000Perhaps what we need isn't more hours in the day, but more energy in our hours. That's ultimately what this episode is about: feeling better and more alive so we can get more results from our businesses.

Yuri Elkaim is a former professional soccer player, a Registered Holistic Nutritionist, the author of The All-Day Energy Diet, several other books, and you can find out more about Yuri and his health adventures at YuriElkaim.com.

Yuri promotes "energy through tranquility rather than stimulation," which is an ideal that resonated with me.

In this episode, Yuri runs through 7 energy commandments to be aware of going into 2017 if you want to be your most energized self to-date.

]]>Perhaps what we need isn't more hours in the day, but more energy in our hours. That's ultimately what this episode is about: feeling better and more alive so we can get more results from our businesses.

Yuri Elkaim is a former professional soccer player, a Registered Holistic Nutritionist, the author of The All-Day Energy Diet, several other books, and you can find out more about Yuri and his health adventures at YuriElkaim.com.

Yuri promotes "energy through tranquility rather than stimulation," which is an ideal that resonated with me.

In this episode, Yuri runs through 7 energy commandments to be aware of going into 2017 if you want to be your most energized self to-date.

]]>38:39no210: Steal This Process: A Step-by-Step System to Consistent $10k MonthsThu, 05 Jan 2017 10:00:00 +0000Nagina Abdullah turned her weight loss blog, MasalaBody.com, into a 6-figure side business. By day, she works for a large consulting company, and with a busy work schedule, a young family, and limited time to work on her side hustle, Nagina has been very smart about her marketing and pricing.

After struggling with her weight for all of her adult life, she finally hit on something that worked and dropped 40 pounds! With friends, colleagues, and neighbors asking how she did it, she started her blog to share recipes and tips.

But she soon discovered that people didn't want recipes; they wanted to lose weight! Quickly, Nagina adapted and used her own success story as a catalyst to begin helping other women make some serious lifestyle changes.

Her sales funnel process is applicable across a broad range of industries and business models, and I think you'll find a way to put some of her tactics and strategies into practice for your own hustle.

]]>Nagina Abdullah turned her weight loss blog, MasalaBody.com, into a 6-figure side business. By day, she works for a large consulting company, and with a busy work schedule, a young family, and limited time to work on her side hustle, Nagina has been very smart about her marketing and pricing.

After struggling with her weight for all of her adult life, she finally hit on something that worked and dropped 40 pounds! With friends, colleagues, and neighbors asking how she did it, she started her blog to share recipes and tips.

But she soon discovered that people didn't want recipes; they wanted to lose weight! Quickly, Nagina adapted and used her own success story as a catalyst to begin helping other women make some serious lifestyle changes.

Her sales funnel process is applicable across a broad range of industries and business models, and I think you'll find a way to put some of her tactics and strategies into practice for your own hustle.

]]>49:09no209: Amazon FBA Private Label Strategies for 2017 – Featuring Two 7-Figure SellersThu, 29 Dec 2016 10:00:00 +0000As a private label seller on Amazon, Andy has seen his revenue grow from $400k in year one, to $900k in year two, and he is closing in on $1.8 million for year three!

I last spoke with Andy "Slamazon" Slamans on episode 84 of The Side Hustle Show. Back in 2014, Andy was wrapping up his first year as a full-time Amazon seller and on the podcast he shared all his best tips for product research and getting started as an FBA private label seller.

I was excited to have Andy back on the show along with his Amazon FBA business partner Liran Hirschkorn. Both Andy and Liran are now running 7-figure Amazon private label businesses!

In this episode, they share how the FBA landscape has changed over the last couple of years, and how they have moved with the changes to build successful businesses.

Tune in to hear Andy and Liran explain the process they are currently using to perform product research so they know they are sourcing products that will sell. You'll also learn how they create “bundles” and unique products that separate them from their competitors, and how they launch their products and gain initial traction within the Amazon search engine.

This episode is packed with everything you need to know to start your own FBA private labeling business or start taking your business to the heights that these guys are at.

]]>As a private label seller on Amazon, Andy has seen his revenue grow from $400k in year one, to $900k in year two, and he is closing in on $1.8 million for year three!

I last spoke with Andy "Slamazon" Slamans on episode 84 of The Side Hustle Show. Back in 2014, Andy was wrapping up his first year as a full-time Amazon seller and on the podcast he shared all his best tips for product research and getting started as an FBA private label seller.

I was excited to have Andy back on the show along with his Amazon FBA business partner Liran Hirschkorn. Both Andy and Liran are now running 7-figure Amazon private label businesses!

In this episode, they share how the FBA landscape has changed over the last couple of years, and how they have moved with the changes to build successful businesses.

Tune in to hear Andy and Liran explain the process they are currently using to perform product research so they know they are sourcing products that will sell. You'll also learn how they create “bundles” and unique products that separate them from their competitors, and how they launch their products and gain initial traction within the Amazon search engine.

This episode is packed with everything you need to know to start your own FBA private labeling business or start taking your business to the heights that these guys are at.

Josh Bauerle is the CPA on fire at cpaonfire.com. Josh specializes in tax preparation, tax planning, booking keeping, and general consulting services to take the accounting side of your business to the next level.

Just 30 minutes with Josh about a month ago saved me thousands of dollars, so you owe it to yourself to listen to this episode and see if you can put some money back in your pocket too.

In this episode, Josh goes into detail about the tax implications with each type of business entity you can form, as well as how you can potentially save thousands of dollars by registering as an S-Corp.

Josh also covers which expenses are deductible to your business, how to include health insurance as a tax-deductible, and how you can reduce your tax bill by investing more into retirement accounts. He also spends some time explaining the often confusing issue of how much sales tax FBA sellers should be paying and under which state tax laws, as well as recommending a service to automate the process.

Tune in as Josh answers several questions from the Side Hustle Nation community and shares some of his best tax saving tips and advice. This isn’t another one of those dry conversations around tax, it’s packed with actionable tips and advice to help you put more money back into your pocket.

]]>Note: Click here to download Josh's top tax saving tips and advice from this episode.

Josh Bauerle is the CPA on fire at cpaonfire.com. Josh specializes in tax preparation, tax planning, booking keeping, and general consulting services to take the accounting side of your business to the next level.

Just 30 minutes with Josh about a month ago saved me thousands of dollars, so you owe it to yourself to listen to this episode and see if you can put some money back in your pocket too.

In this episode, Josh goes into detail about the tax implications with each type of business entity you can form, as well as how you can potentially save thousands of dollars by registering as an S-Corp.

Josh also covers which expenses are deductible to your business, how to include health insurance as a tax-deductible, and how you can reduce your tax bill by investing more into retirement accounts. He also spends some time explaining the often confusing issue of how much sales tax FBA sellers should be paying and under which state tax laws, as well as recommending a service to automate the process.

Tune in as Josh answers several questions from the Side Hustle Nation community and shares some of his best tax saving tips and advice. This isn’t another one of those dry conversations around tax, it’s packed with actionable tips and advice to help you put more money back into your pocket.

Thomas also has a podcast, and a YouTube channel with an impressive following of over 400,000 subscribers and over 14 million views.

Thomas’ blogging journey started back in 2010 when he applied to join a team of writers working on a blog in the college/student niche - but he was unsuccessful. He decided to publish his post on his own site, started introducing different forms of multimedia over the years, and stumbled across a love for producing entertaining YouTube videos.

“There wasn’t a whole lot of really compelling content for how to study, how to take tests, how to read text books, all the kinds of questions students were asking me about as a blogger.” Thomas told me. This was an open door for him to produce high-quality informational videos in his niche and provide the kind of content his audience wanted.

Thomas is now a “YouTuber”, and although he has many income streams his YouTube channel ad revenue makes up a large portion of his monthly income.

Tune in to hear how Thomas grew his YouTube channel to 400k subscribers in 2.5 years. He shares his marketing hacks, tips he used to write more compelling titles that perform well in YouTube’s search algorithm and attracts more clicks, and how he developed a lead magnet that not only attracts email subscribers but earns decent revenue too.

Thomas also has a podcast, and a YouTube channel with an impressive following of over 400,000 subscribers and over 14 million views.

Thomas’ blogging journey started back in 2010 when he applied to join a team of writers working on a blog in the college/student niche - but he was unsuccessful. He decided to publish his post on his own site, started introducing different forms of multimedia over the years, and stumbled across a love for producing entertaining YouTube videos.

“There wasn’t a whole lot of really compelling content for how to study, how to take tests, how to read text books, all the kinds of questions students were asking me about as a blogger.” Thomas told me. This was an open door for him to produce high-quality informational videos in his niche and provide the kind of content his audience wanted.

Thomas is now a “YouTuber”, and although he has many income streams his YouTube channel ad revenue makes up a large portion of his monthly income.

Tune in to hear how Thomas grew his YouTube channel to 400k subscribers in 2.5 years. He shares his marketing hacks, tips he used to write more compelling titles that perform well in YouTube’s search algorithm and attracts more clicks, and how he developed a lead magnet that not only attracts email subscribers but earns decent revenue too.

]]>43:15no206: Go Where the Cash is Already FlowingThu, 15 Dec 2016 16:59:42 +0000I’d like to introduce some of the characters in my latest book Buy Buttons, and also give you a sample of the audiobook version I recorded.

I knew I wanted to create an audiobook for this title, because Audible is yet another “Buy Button” marketplace for me to test out, and because I’ve heard audiobooks can actually perform really well for authors.

But even for someone who’s been editing audio for the last 3.5 years on this podcast, it was quite a challenge to get the book recorded and approved for sale. In fact, it was rejected by Audible 4 or 5 different times for various reasons.

Just reading my own words without messing up and with intonations that made sense was hard enough!

That put a little damper on my timeline, as I’d hoped to get it out much closer to the launch date of the Kindle and paperback editions. Still, now that the audiobook is approved, it’s already been selling well with very little promotion.

In this episode I share the full introduction to Buy Buttons plus you’ll meet a few of the side hustlers I connected with during the writing process.

As you know, most business books follow a familiar format: big picture thesis, supported by case studies and examples. Feeling no need to reinvent the wheel, Buy Buttons follows this formula as well. The big picture thesis is that the fastest way to earn extra money is to go where money is already being spent: the hundreds of peer-to-peer marketplaces.

I was able to source several stories from The Side Hustle Show archives and the blog archives to back that thesis up, but still had a bunch of gaps to fill in.

For those, I turned to HARO, the Side Hustle Nation Facebook group and email list, and even reaching out to the marketplaces directly to see if they had any successful sellers I could potentially feature.

]]>I’d like to introduce some of the characters in my latest book Buy Buttons, and also give you a sample of the audiobook version I recorded.

I knew I wanted to create an audiobook for this title, because Audible is yet another “Buy Button” marketplace for me to test out, and because I’ve heard audiobooks can actually perform really well for authors.

But even for someone who’s been editing audio for the last 3.5 years on this podcast, it was quite a challenge to get the book recorded and approved for sale. In fact, it was rejected by Audible 4 or 5 different times for various reasons.

Just reading my own words without messing up and with intonations that made sense was hard enough!

That put a little damper on my timeline, as I’d hoped to get it out much closer to the launch date of the Kindle and paperback editions. Still, now that the audiobook is approved, it’s already been selling well with very little promotion.

In this episode I share the full introduction to Buy Buttons plus you’ll meet a few of the side hustlers I connected with during the writing process.

As you know, most business books follow a familiar format: big picture thesis, supported by case studies and examples. Feeling no need to reinvent the wheel, Buy Buttons follows this formula as well. The big picture thesis is that the fastest way to earn extra money is to go where money is already being spent: the hundreds of peer-to-peer marketplaces.

I was able to source several stories from The Side Hustle Show archives and the blog archives to back that thesis up, but still had a bunch of gaps to fill in.

For those, I turned to HARO, the Side Hustle Nation Facebook group and email list, and even reaching out to the marketplaces directly to see if they had any successful sellers I could potentially feature.

]]>24:01no205: From a $1 Million Bankruptcy to $20k in Monthly Recurring Revenue: A Productized Service Case StudyThu, 08 Dec 2016 10:00:20 +000042:05no204: Your Legal Questions AnsweredThu, 01 Dec 2016 10:00:46 +000046:25no203: How to Stop Just Listening to The Side Hustle Show and Start Taking ActionThu, 24 Nov 2016 10:00:24 +000014:14no202: Blogging for Recurring Revenue: Turn Readers into MembersThu, 17 Nov 2016 10:00:55 +0000Erin Chase is a busy mother of 4, a former teacher, and today runs 5DollarDinners.com and the 5dollarmealplan.

Back in 2008, after some number crunching, Erin was excited at saving 50% on her grocery bills. She shared how she did this on her family blog, but with a low amount of interest she decided to start her own blog to help others make savings on their own grocery bills.

You may have heard the saying, “there’s no such thing as a free lunch” – well there is such a thing as free meal plans. Erin carried on publishing free meal plans and tips how to feed your family on a budget and her viewership kept growing.

In this episode, you will hear how Erin capitalized on the momentum of viral social media posts to set up paywalls and start generating more income. You’ll learn how she transitioned from ad networks and affiliate income to selling directly to her audience, and how she set up membership programs for recurring revenue.

Back in 2008, after some number crunching, Erin was excited at saving 50% on her grocery bills. She shared how she did this on her family blog, but with a low amount of interest she decided to start her own blog to help others make savings on their own grocery bills.

You may have heard the saying, “there’s no such thing as a free lunch” – well there is such a thing as free meal plans. Erin carried on publishing free meal plans and tips how to feed your family on a budget and her viewership kept growing.

In this episode, you will hear how Erin capitalized on the momentum of viral social media posts to set up paywalls and start generating more income. You’ll learn how she transitioned from ad networks and affiliate income to selling directly to her audience, and how she set up membership programs for recurring revenue.

]]>34:51no201: The OPA Plan: How to Borrow Other People’s Audiences to Explode Your SalesThu, 10 Nov 2016 10:00:16 +000039:13no200: From Content to Cash Flow – Affiliate Marketing and Automated Sales FunnelsThu, 03 Nov 2016 09:00:47 +0000As co-host of the #1 marriage podcast in iTunes, the ONE Extraordinary Marriage show, Tony DiLorenzo speaks to a worldwide audience about sex, love, and commitment. Along with his wife Alisa, their goal is to reach as many couples around the world as they can, equipping them with the tools and strategies they need to create an extraordinary marriage.

With a hugely popular blog and podcast, Tony is a little modest in saying, “that’s consistency over 7 years.” Tony and Alisa sell coaching services, their own products, promote affiliate products, and have sponsorships as some of their income streams. Over the last 7 years they have come a long way with their brand from a side hustle hobby to a full-time business.

Want to start an online business of your own? It starts with a website, and my free 6-part video series walks you through how to set it up without breaking the bank.

Tune in to hear Tony taking me through the steps he took to build up his podcast to over 150k downloads a month, the tools and techniques he uses to drive traffic to his lead magnets, how he has a tiered upsell funnel, and how he and his wife have built up profitable and diverse income streams.

]]>As co-host of the #1 marriage podcast in iTunes, the ONE Extraordinary Marriage show, Tony DiLorenzo speaks to a worldwide audience about sex, love, and commitment. Along with his wife Alisa, their goal is to reach as many couples around the world as they can, equipping them with the tools and strategies they need to create an extraordinary marriage.

With a hugely popular blog and podcast, Tony is a little modest in saying, “that’s consistency over 7 years.” Tony and Alisa sell coaching services, their own products, promote affiliate products, and have sponsorships as some of their income streams. Over the last 7 years they have come a long way with their brand from a side hustle hobby to a full-time business.

Want to start an online business of your own? It starts with a website, and my free 6-part video series walks you through how to set it up without breaking the bank.

Tune in to hear Tony taking me through the steps he took to build up his podcast to over 150k downloads a month, the tools and techniques he uses to drive traffic to his lead magnets, how he has a tiered upsell funnel, and how he and his wife have built up profitable and diverse income streams.

]]>47:48no199: Building a Blog to $20k a Month and BeyondThu, 27 Oct 2016 09:00:37 +0000You may remember Rosemarie Groner from episode 142 of the Side Hustle Show last year. She revealed how her blog Busy Budgeter was just a year old and receiving around 400,000 pageviews and making around $5k a month — primarily through Pinterest traffic.

It’s almost a year later now and I had to have her back to see how things were progressing. Rosemarie is now regularly making more than $20k a month, and while her pageviews are still at a similar number she has improved her ROI and diversified her traffic and income sources.

Rosemarie is still getting a ton of traffic from Pinterest and explains how she has moved with the changes on the platform to maintain her numbers. She also talks about how she has started focusing on SEO, has built different email lists to sell different products to, and why calculating the ROI on a project should be one of your first considerations.

Her first appearance on episode 142 was one of the most popular shows of last year and I expect this episode to be just as popular. It’s packed with actionable tips and information you can use to increase your own traffic numbers and earnings, along with some of the new tips and tricks Rosemarie has implemented in the last year.

]]>You may remember Rosemarie Groner from episode 142 of the Side Hustle Show last year. She revealed how her blog Busy Budgeter was just a year old and receiving around 400,000 pageviews and making around $5k a month — primarily through Pinterest traffic.

It’s almost a year later now and I had to have her back to see how things were progressing. Rosemarie is now regularly making more than $20k a month, and while her pageviews are still at a similar number she has improved her ROI and diversified her traffic and income sources.

Rosemarie is still getting a ton of traffic from Pinterest and explains how she has moved with the changes on the platform to maintain her numbers. She also talks about how she has started focusing on SEO, has built different email lists to sell different products to, and why calculating the ROI on a project should be one of your first considerations.

Her first appearance on episode 142 was one of the most popular shows of last year and I expect this episode to be just as popular. It’s packed with actionable tips and information you can use to increase your own traffic numbers and earnings, along with some of the new tips and tricks Rosemarie has implemented in the last year.

]]>37:00no198: Blogging, Branding, Book Writing, and Finding the Right Side Hustle for You: 20 Questions with NickThu, 20 Oct 2016 09:00:38 +000028:29no197: Prioritization, Elimination, Automation, and Delegation for Side Hustle Nation: A Productivity RoundtableThu, 13 Oct 2016 09:00:20 +000054:30no195: How Book Marketing Really Works: Tips from a 6-Figure Self-Published AuthorThu, 29 Sep 2016 09:00:34 +000038:58no194: A 6-Figure Amazon FBA Business in 7 MonthsThu, 22 Sep 2016 09:00:46 +000039:01no193: Getting Paid to Show Off Your City: How to Start a Tour Guide Side HustleThu, 15 Sep 2016 09:00:36 +000035:42no192: Starting an Ecommerce Empire on EtsyThu, 08 Sep 2016 09:00:41 +000038:01no191: Reverse-Engineering a Bestselling Book LaunchThu, 01 Sep 2016 09:00:16 +000032:19no190: How a Former Hairdresser Turned Her Side Hustle Into a 6-Figure Business, with Rachel PedersenThu, 25 Aug 2016 09:00:47 +000033:20no189: How to Start an Online Store – Without Touching Any Inventory (Drop Shipping 101)Thu, 18 Aug 2016 09:00:01 +000036:47no188: Matt’s Passive Income Empire Started With Just $36 … and a Bag of GumballsThu, 11 Aug 2016 09:00:32 +000034:17no187: Traffic Hacks for 2016 and Beyond, with Neil PatelThu, 04 Aug 2016 09:00:04 +0000Before people can do business with you, they have to know about you, and before they know about you, they have to find you.

And that’s universal, whether you’re running a brick-and-mortar shop, an ecommerce store, a blog, or a virtual consulting business.

Neil Patel is a master at solving the first step in that equation: getting people to find you. Through SEO, content marketing, and social media, we go through the traffic generation tactics that are working today.

Neil runs a handful of online projects, including NeilPatel.com, QuickSprout.com, and the heatmap software tool CrazyEgg.com. His latest project is a book called HUSTLE (a title I can definitely get behind), due out in September and all about how you can (and must) make your own luck in an economy rigged against you.

This episode is all about how new and experienced content creators can get more visitors to their work.

]]>Before people can do business with you, they have to know about you, and before they know about you, they have to find you.

And that’s universal, whether you’re running a brick-and-mortar shop, an ecommerce store, a blog, or a virtual consulting business.

Neil Patel is a master at solving the first step in that equation: getting people to find you. Through SEO, content marketing, and social media, we go through the traffic generation tactics that are working today.

Neil runs a handful of online projects, including NeilPatel.com, QuickSprout.com, and the heatmap software tool CrazyEgg.com. His latest project is a book called HUSTLE (a title I can definitely get behind), due out in September and all about how you can (and must) make your own luck in an economy rigged against you.

This episode is all about how new and experienced content creators can get more visitors to their work.

]]>25:57no186: Happiness is a Skill, and This 5-Minute Habit Can Help You Get Better at ItThu, 28 Jul 2016 09:00:56 +000025:37no185: I Quit My Job 8 Years Ago! Here Are 8 Lessons I’ve Learned Since Then That You Can Apply TodayFri, 22 Jul 2016 09:00:39 +000022:34no184: How to Create, Market, and Sell Your First Online Course – Even With a Small AudienceThu, 21 Jul 2016 09:00:29 +0000Teaching what you know in the form of an online course has become the bread and butter for many online entrepreneurs. You can see the appeal: package all your best stuff into a logical and well-presented lesson plan, record it, and sell it over and over again.

Course creation has the potential to be a fantastic passive income business, just like book sales or software. Build an asset that has low-to-zero incremental costs, and sell as many copies as you can — sometimes for $1000 or more.

In this episode I’m chatting with Bailey Richert and her advice for budding “infopreneurs.” In her words, you don’t need a huge audience to start building a successful business, but you would be wise to follow a few important steps.

Related: To build an online business, you need to get online. My free video course will show you how to quickly and affordably set up your first website.

]]>Teaching what you know in the form of an online course has become the bread and butter for many online entrepreneurs. You can see the appeal: package all your best stuff into a logical and well-presented lesson plan, record it, and sell it over and over again.

Course creation has the potential to be a fantastic passive income business, just like book sales or software. Build an asset that has low-to-zero incremental costs, and sell as many copies as you can — sometimes for $1000 or more.

In this episode I’m chatting with Bailey Richert and her advice for budding “infopreneurs.” In her words, you don’t need a huge audience to start building a successful business, but you would be wise to follow a few important steps.

Related: To build an online business, you need to get online. My free video course will show you how to quickly and affordably set up your first website.

I think her model can be replicated across a number of different niches and industries so you can apply these same strategies and tactics in your business.

Tune in to hear how she came up with the idea for the challenge, the innovative way she grew her tribe, and how giving it all away for free turned into a very profitable venture.

]]>More than 150,000 women have completed Tiffany “The Budgetnetista” Aliche’s Live Richer Challenge. The roughly 30-day challenge participants step-by-step instructions on how to get their financial lives in order, get out of debt, and start saving money.

Collectively, Tiffany’s tribe has saved $17 million and paid off $1.5 in debt!

I first heard Tiffany tell the story of how she started the challenge and how that’s turned into a thriving business at FinCon last year, and am excited to share it with you this week.

This year, The Budgetnetista expects to bring in more than $500,000 from speaking, book sales, sponsors and affiliate relationships, and a new private membership academy.

I think her model can be replicated across a number of different niches and industries so you can apply these same strategies and tactics in your business.

Tune in to hear how she came up with the idea for the challenge, the innovative way she grew her tribe, and how giving it all away for free turned into a very profitable venture.

]]>31:44no178: How To Build a 6-Figure eBay Business Part-TimeThu, 16 Jun 2016 09:00:35 +000035:41no177: What I’ve Learned and Applied from 49 Awesome Entrepreneurs – Part 3Thu, 09 Jun 2016 09:00:32 +000024:04no176: Freelance Transformation: From $300 Technician to $20,000 Consultant, with Matt InglotThu, 02 Jun 2016 09:00:36 +000034:35no175: YouTube Marketing: How to Use Free Videos to Build a Full-Time Online BusinessThu, 26 May 2016 09:00:52 +000034:06no174: How to Get Freelance Jobs (Tips from a Professional Hypnotist)Thu, 19 May 2016 09:00:57 +000031:08no173: How to Turn Your Ideas Into Recurring Revenue, with Stephen KeyThu, 12 May 2016 09:00:01 +000031:07no172: Case Study: Creating a $1k per Week Online Authority Business and a Service Business From ScratchThu, 05 May 2016 09:00:19 +0000Carey Green had spent the last 20 years as a pastor, before making the leap into entrepreneurship. As he studied to become a licensed mortgage broker, an idea took hold to put his study notes online. Today Carey helps other aspiring mortgage brokers pass their certification exam, a test he says was the hardest he ever took. That business, which actually derives most of its traffic from YouTube, generates $1000 a week! But Carey didn't stop there.]]>Carey Green had spent the last 20 years as a pastor, before making the leap into entrepreneurship. As he studied to become a licensed mortgage broker, an idea took hold to put his study notes online. Today Carey helps other aspiring mortgage brokers pass their certification exam, a test he says was the hardest he ever took. That business, which actually derives most of its traffic from YouTube, generates $1000 a week! But Carey didn't stop there.]]>34:05no171: How to Get Paid to Create Content – Even When You’re Just Starting OutThu, 28 Apr 2016 09:00:09 +000035:48no170: Side Hustle Idea Brainstorming: The 7 Rules of Business Idea Generation Plus Live Listener FeedbackThu, 21 Apr 2016 09:00:04 +000048:10no169: The Best Passive Income Model: Raw Land Investing Update (Part 2)Fri, 15 Apr 2016 09:00:47 +000021:09no168: The Best Passive Income Model: Raw Land Investing Update (Part 1)Thu, 14 Apr 2016 09:00:35 +000025:34no167: Earn up to $1700/mo Part-Time: Profit Stacking in The Sharing EconomyThu, 07 Apr 2016 09:00:57 +000023:23no166: $10k a Month Blogging Part-TimeThu, 31 Mar 2016 09:00:55 +0000We first heard from Robert Farrington back in 2013, on episode 10 of The Side Hustle Show. At that time, he was earning $3-4k a month from a portfolio of different sites, and looking to expand his online empire.

This week, we catch up on what’s changed since then. Robert’s doubled down on his main site, TheCollegeInvestor.com, narrowed his focus, and roughly tripled his earnings.

Oh, and he’s still working full-time too.

We chat content, traffic, and monetization strategies, as well as how he manages the business in his spare time.

]]>We first heard from Robert Farrington back in 2013, on episode 10 of The Side Hustle Show. At that time, he was earning $3-4k a month from a portfolio of different sites, and looking to expand his online empire.

This week, we catch up on what’s changed since then. Robert’s doubled down on his main site, TheCollegeInvestor.com, narrowed his focus, and roughly tripled his earnings.

Oh, and he’s still working full-time too.

We chat content, traffic, and monetization strategies, as well as how he manages the business in his spare time.

]]>33:25no165: How to Earn an Extra $1000 a Month as a Brand AmbassadorThu, 24 Mar 2016 09:00:59 +000020:28no164: $4k a Month within 6 Months: Marketing and Growing a Freelance Side Hustle, with Gina HorkeyThu, 17 Mar 2016 09:00:13 +000031:34no163: How to Build a 6-Figure Blog in Less Than a Year, with Jon DykstraThu, 10 Mar 2016 10:00:03 +0000Do you know Jon Dykstra from FatStacksBlog.com? I've been following his work since last summer and have been really impressed.

Jon is a former attorney turned full-time entrepreneur, and he’s the master of building high quality niche blogs and monetizing them to $10k-20k per month in record time.